Survival till The End
by Jackie Wepps
Summary: What would you do if you suddenly woke up some strange, unfamiliar place with fourteen other people and you were told that you could only get out if you killed someone and weren't found out by the others? (A lot of character deaths) (Genre ?)
1. The Beginning

**Yup! If you haven't guessed it yet, I've borrowed the setting of Dangan Ronpa. You don't need to know the game to understand the story... I think... It should make sense.**

 **Anyways, I hope you enjoy!**

* * *

He awoke in darkness, not knowing where he was. All he could sense was that he was lying on something hard. If he had to take a guess, it was probably the floor of some room. But where was this room? He couldn't even tell what kind of room it was, everything around him was black.

He decided to sit up and see what he gained from that, and so he did, moving slowly and carefully.

"Who is there?" A voice sounded from the darkness.

"That's my line," he answered as he heard the owner of the voice sit up.

"Careful, you're sitting under a table," the voice warned.

"How do you know?" he asked the voice.

"I can see it," the other answered.

"Could you turn on some light then? I feel like I'm completely blind," he said while raising a hand above his head. The voice was right. There was something wooden only a few centimeters from the top of his head. If he hadn't been warned, his head, and maybe even his entire body would be sore by now.

He could now hear the other move around and before long he heard a little click and the lights went on. He looked in the direction of the click and saw a blonde boy dressed in a primarily white uniform. His eyes were bright blue. He saw this as their eyes met.

"Thanks for that," he said. "What's your name?"

"My name is Mika," the other blurted and then looked surprised. It didn't seem like he had intended to just spill it out like that.

"I'm Yuu, nice to meet you, Mika," Yuu said as he crawled out from under the table and stood. He sent the blonde boy a wide smile as he did. "Do you know what this place is?" he asked then, while looking around in the room.

"It looks like a dining room," Mika answered.

He was right. There was a long table with 16 seats around in the middle of the room. It was that table Yuu had been under until just now. There were two doors in the room. Both were closed. Mika was standing by one of those doors. There were no windows in the room though.

"Where do you think this place is?" Yuu asked.

Mika shook his head. "I have no clue," he answered.

Yuu nodded and then started walking up to the door Mika was standing by. He wrapped his hand around the handle and prepared to open it, but before he could, he felt a hand on his shoulder and looked to his left to see Mika's concerned eyes.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"I figure there's only one way to have my question answered, and that's to go out and see for myself where we are at," Yuu answered. He had already made up his mind, but before he could press the handle, a sound was heard from the corner of the room and Mika and Yuu now both noticed the TV which was turned on.

A man with long silver hair tied back in a ponytail appeared on the screen. His red eyes seemed to be fixated on the two boys as a wide smile of amusement appeared on his face.

"Welcome," he said happily. "You may notice that you are now in a place that is completely unfamiliar to you. I will explain everything to you, where you are and why as soon as everyone has shown up at the area marked on this map."

A map now appeared on the screen. Rooms were named with little texts within. There was only one black space and a gray one. The gray space was the largest room. It was between the black and gray room and the gaming room that a red X marked where they were supposed to meet. Yuu only stared at that X until the man's face came back on the screen.

"I want you to be here in five minutes exactly, so don't draw it out," he smiled and waved before the screen went back to being black, only reflecting Yuu's surprised expression and Mika's cold one.

"Let's go, Yuu," Mika said before turning around on his heel.

Yuu nodded and followed Mika out the door. It seemed that Mika had taken the time to figure out where they were and where they were to go in order to reach the place marked on the map. Once they were out in the hallway, he turned left and walked until the end of the hallway before turning the corner and heading right until they reached an open space.

In the open space there were already 13 other people. Six female and seven male people were standing there.

"Oh look, the last ones finally showed," a very short girl with ashen lavender hair said. She had a mischievous smile on her lips as she looked up and down Yuu and Mika.

"How annoying," a pink-haired boy with glasses muttered.

"Now, now," a brown-haired guy with green eyes said in a calming manner. "We all had to find this place. We just arrived here too," he told the pink-haired.

"Who are you guys?" Yuu asked.

"That is not of any importance at the moment," the voice from the TV said. "Introductions can be made later. For now, I would rather introduce the game to you."

Everyone turned their attentions to a giant double door. In front of it, was some stairs and at the top of them stood the man from the TV screen with silver hair and red eyes and that smile like he was scheming something.

"Yeah," a black-haired man with purple eyes said. "You promised us some answers so you better give them."

"On my way," the man said. "Let me start by introducing myself. I am Ferid," the man said. "I am the one who brought you here for this little game of entertainment."

"Entertainment?" Yuu wondered.

"I don't trust that," Mika commented beside him.

"Oh come on, it'll be fun," Ferid said while smiling. "I will put up a map of this floor as you know the rooms and their position."

"Is he making fun of us?" a guy with half-long brown hair pulled back into a ponytail muttered.

"Not in the slightest," Ferid answered the mutter. "It might just be helpful later on is all," he smiled and looked around at everyone. "As to why this might be helpful? I thought it might be fun to try and have some random people participate in a game of mutual killings. Don't you agree?" he asked.

A woman with brown hair took a step back and made a small, scared sound. Aside from her, no one seemed to react.

"Mutual killings?" a man with black hair and red eyes said.

"Indeed," Ferid said. "One murder can be committed and then you will be allowed to investigate the case and then we will hold a trial. At these, you have to decide on the person you think committed this murder. If everyone votes for the right person, they are executed. However, if you point towards a different person, an innocent, everyone but the actual murderer will be executed and the murderer is allowed to leave this place alive. The game ends when only one person is left."

"So… we all have to kill each other?" Yuu asked.

Ferid's smiled widened, if that was even possible. "Precisely," he said. "Well then, I wish you luck!" and with that, he disappeared.


	2. Daily Meeting

Everyone was staring silently at the space where Ferid had just been standing. It took a little while before anyone pulled it together enough to break this deafening silence.

"So we have to kill each other?" Yuu muttered.

"Looks like it," Mika said.

"I don't want this! I want to go home!" the brown-haired woman who had gotten the most scared earlier said. "It's really not a good idea to kill!"

"I agree," the brown-haired boy with green eyes said.

Yuu nodded. "I don't think we should start killing each other either. I want to make friends with all of you instead, so let's start by introducing ourselves. That's the best way to start getting to know each other after all." He smiled friendly as he said this. "I'm Yuu, the blonde boy next to me is Mika."

"That's not such a bad idea," the purple-haired girl said. "I'm Shinoa, nice to meet you," she smiled

"My name is Mahiru," a girl who looked a lot like Shinoa said. She had long ashen hair too but unlike Shinoa's hair, Mahiru's was hanging loose.

"I'm Kureto," the black-haired with red eyes said.

"I'm Norito," a man with bleach blonde hair said. He flashed a smile at the scared brown-haired woman.

"I'm Mitsuba," a girl with blonde pigtails said while smiling.

"My name's Makoto," the brown-haired man with the ponytail said.

"My name is Sayuri, it's very nice to meet you," the brown-haired woman whom Norito had smiled at said.

"Shigure." The black-haired woman next to her simply said her name before falling silent.

"I'm Mito," a woman with long red hair pulled up in a ponytail said.

"I am Shiho," the pink-haired guy with glasses said.

"My name is Yoichi," the brown-haired boy with green eyes said.

"Call me Shinya," a man with white hair said and then everyone fell silent, looking at the black-haired guy with purple eyes next to him. Shinya gave this guy and elbow in the side and smiled. "Introduce yourself," he said.

The other man sighed. "Guren," he said.

"Now what?" Shinya asked after Guren had said his name.

"I'm hungry," Yuu said. "Anyone who knows if there's anything to eat?" he asked.

"You took so long I thought that was what you were checking," Shinoa said sarcastically.

"We were in the dining room, not in the kitchen!" Yuu shot at her.

"Those are right next to each other," Shiho said coldly. "Didn't you notice?"

"I was too busy looking at that red X marking where we were to meet," Yuu snapped.

"At any rate," Shinya interrupted the discussion. "I guess I'm kinda hungry too so let's go see what kind of food we've got and then sit down and talk about our situation and whatever else we come up with," he said.

"Question," Makoto raised his hand. "Anyone who knows how to cook?"

"I do," Sayuri said in a slightly hesitant manner.

"So do I," Shiho said.

Satisfied with the fact that two of 15 were able to cook, the entire group headed towards the kitchen to see what they could find that was eatable. It turned out there were lots and lots of food. There was tab-water, milk and even cola for drinks too.

"This is truly luxury," Shinya said as he grabbed a bottle of cola and found some glasses. "Who wants cola?" he asked.

"I want barley tea," Guren said in a dry tone.

"Everyone will have cola," Shinya decided, completely ignoring Guren's words as he started pouring cola into 15 glasses.

Sayuri found some rice and looked at everyone. "I-Is there something specific you want me to make?" she asked.

"Curry," Guren said.

Yuu smiled. "Curry doesn't sound half-bad," he said.

"I'm fine with anything," Kureto said.

"I'm up for curry," Mahiru smiled while looking briefly at Guren. Then she looked to Shinoa. "What do you think?" she asked.

Shinoa thought too. "Curry is fine. I don't really care either way," she smiled.

Sayuri nodded. "If no one opposes… curry it is then," she said before she started making curry. Everyone else went to the dining room to sit around the table and wait for Sayuri to finish cooking. Shinya brought each of them a glass of cola in the meantime.

They sat and talked while waiting for curry and while eating curry and then they decided to go elsewhere and spend some time.

Shinya and Mito had discovered a common fondness of games and decided to go check out the gaming room. Sayuri, Shigure and Norito went along with them while Guren was forcefully dragged along by Shinya.

Kureto disappeared somewhere on his own. No one knew where he went and no one really cared either way. He wasn't exactly one of those types who made people feel comfortable.

Mahiru said she had to go to the restroom for a bit and left Yuu, Mika, Shinoa, Mitsuba, Yoichi, Shiho and Makoto by the table.

"Someone has to do the dishes…" Shiho said while looking over the table. Everyone had just left their bowls and he was pretty sure the kitchen was all messy. Yuu could see the mess from where he was sitting. It looked like a lot of hard, troublesome work.

"I'm not doing it," he said. "Makoto can do it." He just said the name randomly because Makoto was the first he laid eyes on.

"Me?" Makoto asked. "Who are you to say that? I decide that you do it," he yelled at Yuu.

"I decide!" Yuu yelled.

"I'm 19 years old! The older gets to decide!" Makoto yelled.

"I'm 20 years old!" Yuu yelled. "Go do the dishes!" he yelled.

Yoichi and Mitsuba didn't feel like listening more to this stupid conversation and therefore left the dining room in a silent agreement that Yuu and Makoto were both idiots.

Makoto shut up. It looked like he had been defeated by Yuu using his own weapon against him. He silently stood up and started heading to the kitchen.

Mika placed a hand on Yuu's shoulder and rolled his eyes. "You know we all have files about each other, stating our name and age, right?" he asked in a hushed voice.

Yuu looked surprised. "Do we? Where?" he asked.

Mika held up a PDA and showed a file holding Yuu's picture, his name, his date of birth, and his age.

"Makoto, check your PDA." It wasn't Mika or Yuu who said this, these words came from Shiho who also had his eyes on his PDA.

Makoto stopped. He was already standing in the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room. He looked over at Shiho and then did as he said and checked his PDA. Mika and Yuu both watched as he found Yuu's file and read it. Then he glared at Yuu.

"You little lying brat," he hissed.

Shinoa couldn't help herself. Before Yuu had the time to think up a reply in his defense, she started laughing so hard that she almost fell to the floor.

"What are you laughing at!" Makoto yelled loudly.

"I can't believe Yuu-san could get away with that!" Shinoa laughed. "I mean, look at him! He's obviously not 20 years old!" she couldn't stop laughing, in fact it just got worse. "To… to think you bought it so easily!" Now tears started rolling down her face because she was laughing so hard.

"Stop laughing!" Makoto yelled.

"How could you be so stupid!" Shinoa didn't stop laughing at all.

"Stop it!" Makoto yelled, getting more and more irritated.

Shinoa didn't stop laughing. Her laughter attack just continued to get worse for each passing second.

"Stop laughing or I'll kill you!"

Shinoa stopped laughing and sat up with a sarcastic smile on her face. "Now, now, no need for such drastic measures, Makoto-san," she said in a sugar-sweet tone.

Makoto snorted. "Then you wash the dishes, Shinoa," he said.

"Gladly," Shinoa smiled before standing up. She walked up to Yuu and grabbed him by the wrist. "Come on, Yuu-san, time to be useful." Then she dragged Yuu off to the kitchen while Makoto left the room. Mika followed them while Shiho went off to find Mitsuba and Yoichi.

* * *

A few hours went by. Everyone were now located in the gaming room except Kureto. No one really cared where he went. Makoto had also disappeared, but no one really seemed to notice because they were all busy playing games.

This was when the screen was turned on and Ferid appeared on it.

"It is now time for bed everyone," he said. "I forgot to mention this, but night hours start at 10 and end at 6. To ensure that you get your beauty sleep I put this in. The power will be off except in the kitchen in these hours, so it's best for you to go to your rooms," he smiled and waved as the screen switched off again.

"If the powers will be off there's no reason to be here," Guren said.

"Agreed," Shinya said. "I think we should all go to our rooms and get some sleep," he suggested.

Everyone agreed and they went to their respective bedrooms. There was a little sign on the door signaling whom the room belonged to. Yuu's room was next to Mika's. He was very happy about that.

To finish off for the day, everyone said goodnight and closed their doors. Then they were left to themselves for the night, and until six in the morning.

* * *

At six, a morning announcement was heard. Ferid just told them that the powers would be back on starting from now, but if you asked Yuu, he seemed strangely amused for some reason.

He was curious as to why Ferid was sounding like this, so he decided to open the door and go out and take a look to see if anything had changed.

What first met his eyes was a set of large cobber eyes in a face, framed by ashen lavender hair. Yuu had never imagined Shinoa could ever look this much like a scared rabbit. At her feet he saw the source of her facial expression and discovered that something big had changed.

"What's the matter, Yuu?" Mika's door had opened beside Yuu and now Mika was also looking around. He too froze when his eyes landed on the blood-pool in the hallway with Makoto lying in the middle. He had a knife in his chest and his face was painted with horror as his empty eyes stared up at the ceiling.

* * *

 **I published a floorplan on Tumblr. I don't know where else to upload pictures. Problem is, I'm not entirely sure of how to leave a link to the post, so maybe Tumblr is not such a good idea. I can try and see if I can leave my own URL as you can perhaps find it. I don't use Tumblr often, so it shouldn't be too difficult. If you want to see it, but can't find it, let me know and I'll upload the floorplan somewhere else that I can leave a link to.**

 **blog/jackiewepps**

 **Thank you for reading**

 **Jackie**


	3. Deadly Meeting

"Good morning everyone!" Ferid appeared on the screen again. "Three people have discovered a corpse, so if you'll all please come out we can begin the investigation and then we'll have the trial," he smiled and waved before the screen switched off again.

All the doors opened almost simultaneously and everyone looked out, staring at Makoto's corpse lying in the middle of the hallway.

"What is this?" Shiho asked in shock.

"I wish I knew…" Yoichi answered.

"We can't stand around," Guren said, stepping forward. "We will need to do some investigation. I suggest we split up into groups and look around for evidence."

"I also think we should have someone stand guard over the corpse," Mito said, stepping forward.

At these words, Shinya turned around on his heel and headed back into his room. Everyone else sent the open door a questioning look.

"What is it?" Norito walked up and stood in the open door to Shinya's room.

"Nothing special," Shinya's voice sounded from the room. "I just figured that if we are to decide guards and groups we should do it by lot. I highly doubt anyone wants to stand guard except, maybe, the culprit."

"Not bad," Kureto muttered.

"Who was first to find him?" Guren asked while looking from Yuu to Mika to Shinoa and then back to Yuu. They had all now gathered around Makoto's dead body and was standing in something that looked like a circle.

Shinoa hesitantly stepped forward and raised her hand. "That'd be me," she said. There was no sarcasm in her voice at all.

"I see," Guren just said before Shinya came back, now with 14 pieces of paper in his hand. He explained that he had written a number on all of them except two. The two who drew blank would be guarding the corpse.

"You just come up and draw a paper one by one." He said with a smile.

Everyone came up to Shinya and pulled out a piece of paper from his hand. Yuu was the last one who got to draw a paper. He looked at the number at the end. It said 1.

Everyone then got busy finding their respective groups. Norito called for all with number one and Yuu walked over. Seconds later, Shigure joined them as well.

Once everyone had found their groups, Shinya spoke again. He was now standing with Mahiru by his side.

"So, Mahiru and I will be standing guard here. The rest of you go looking for some clues." He said.

"Group three will take the kitchen!" Guren said before walking on ahead. Mito and Yoichi got busy following him down the hallway.

"Then group two will be taking his room," Kureto said before walking the opposite direction of Guren with Mika and Mitsuba right behind him.

"Then we'll go to the living room and gaming room," Shiho said.

"A brilliant idea," Shinoa said sarcastically. It hadn't taken her very long to regain her usual sarcastic self and now she seemed to be back to normal.

The group then went away and this left Yuu's group back with Shinya and Mahiru.

"Where would be a good place to go?" Yuu asked, looking from Shigure to Norito.

"Anywhere, perhaps the living room?" Norito asked.

Shigure shook her head. "I think we should try and take a look at as many rooms as possible instead. Maybe one of them hold some kind of clue."

Yuu agreed with this because he had nothing better in mind and he and Norito followed Shigure's lead through the different rooms.

Yuu and Shigure appeared to be the more concentrated on finding clues. Shigure found a lot and Yuu observed most of the time. Norito observed too, but his observations were centered more around Shigure herself than whatever she found that might give them a clue of what happened.

The group was in the middle of trying to open the door that led into the gray room when the screen was turned on again and Ferid appeared with an amused smile on his face.

"Hello everyone, I'm just here to announce that now is the time for the investigation to end, so I hope you've gathered up some useful clues in this case. I want you to assemble at the place where we all first met within five minutes, so let's move it." The last was said in a sing-song voice before the screen went off.

"Well, we are here," Norito said while looking around in the area. Shigure nodded in response. Yuu was watching the hallway from where the others would come.

It took less than five minutes for everyone to show up. Everyone stood still and waited in silence for the last little while… which turned into a longer while… which turned into about five more minutes.

"Been waiting long?" Ferid asked as he appeared through another door that led to the black area of the map.

"You said five minutes," Guren reminded him irritated.

"I did." Ferid didn't deny the fact. "But I expected you to be late so I didn't show up until ten minutes had passed." He paused a little while everyone else wondered if it would be worth punching the guy in the face or if they should find some other and more clever way to express their irritation with him.

"Well," Ferid then said. "Let's get going, the trial is awaiting us," he smiled as he turned on his heel and walked back through the door, leaving it open for the others to follow him though.

They did so, little by little. Yuu and Mika walked in together and saw a huge room with 16 stands placed in a circle. One of them was a little higher than the others and looked more like a throne than anything else. Ferid was already seated there. Each of the stands had a picture on them, showing who had this stand.

Yuu found his own picture on the stand right in front of him. On the stand on his left was a picture of Mika and on the one to his right was a picture of Shinoa who was already standing there and sending him a smile Yuu found himself unable to interpret.

After Sayuri had gotten in place as the last one Ferid stood up.

"Now, let the trial begin," Ferid said before sitting back down to look like one who was going to enjoy a show rather than watching a trial of a murder.

Kureto leaned forward. "Group two searched Makoto's room but we were unable to find any clues as to why he was murdered from looking through it."

"My group searched the kitchen, but found nothing except that the knife found in Makoto's chest was taken from there," Guren said.

"Did you find any fingerprints?" Kureto asked.

"As I said, nothing," Guren repeated himself.

"Then, let's discuss the motive," Mito said.

"Maybe he had taken some naked pictures of one of the girls and kept them hidden somewhere?" Norito suggested half-heartedly.

"They weren't in his room," Kureto said.

"Besides," Shinoa now took the word. "We haven't been here for more than 24 hours and none of us girls have had the time to shower yet," she said.

Norito took a step back, admitting that his theory had been defeated.

"Could Makoto have had something on someone else?" Shiho asked.

"He might have had a grudge…" Mitsuba said thoughtfully.

"A grudge?" Yuu wondered.

Shinoa almost laughed. "Don't tell me you already forgot, Yuu-san," She said.

"Whatever that's about, it can probably wait," Guren said, coldly. "Anyone else who have a theory for a motive to murder him?" he asked.

"Hmm…" Shinya let a thoughtful sound escape. "Maybe someone fell in love with someone whom Makoto already was in love with?" he suggested.

"Or maybe the one the person was in love with, was in love with Makoto?" Yoichi thought out loud.

"Or maybe it was a plot by two who were in love with someone who is in love with Makoto, and maybe he was in love with one of them?" Sayuri asked.

"I'm not following… " Guren mumbled.

"I'm following!" Norito yelled with shiny eyes fixated on Sayuri.

"Then explain it," Guren demanded at him.

This brought Norito to a loss, seeing as he didn't really follow but just said he was to please Sayuri. Yuu had lost track of the love-thing a while ago.

"Maybe we should take a different approach?" Mahiru suggested.

"How would you approach it then?" Shinya asked her.

Mahiru thought. "When do you think it happened?" she asked.

"During night-hours," Shinoa answered immediately. "He was right by my door when I got out this morning, but he wasn't there when I went to bed last night," she explained.

"He was also almost empty for blood if you remember. Most of it was outside his body," Shinya said.

"How do you know?" Guren asked.

"I checked the corpse with Mahiru while the rest of you were out investigating," Shinya answered.

"Did any of you guys see Makoto last night?" Yoichi then asked, causing everyone to turn their attention to him.

"Last time I saw him was when we were having curry," Guren answered.

Most actually agreed with this statement, except a handful who didn't say anything. Yuu was one of them. He stayed silent while Guren started asking everyone when they last saw Makoto alive.

"Yuu, Mika, Shinoa, Yoichi, Shiho, Mitsuba," Guren listed all the names of those who hadn't agreed to his statement. "When did you see Makoto last?"

"In the dining room," Yoichi answered. "He was having an argument with Yuu-kun about who would do the dishes…"

"Same here," Mitsuba said. "Yoichi and I left because it was getting stupid."

"How can a discussion about who will do the dishes get so stupid?" Kureto wondered.

"It's simple actually." Shinoa leaned forward on her elbows. "Mi-chan did say that Makoto-san held a grudge against Yuu-san earlier, it's from then, probably." She smiled widely before continuing, seeing as all eyes were now on her. "They discussed who of them got to decide who should do the dishes. They agreed that the older one would get things the way he wanted. Makoto-san said he was 19 years old and Yuu-san said he was 20 years old, meaning that he would win. Makoto-san nearly bought it until we told him to check his PDA. Because, let's agree, there's no way Yuu-san can be 20 years old."

"I'm 20 years old!" Yuu blurted out. "I just look young for my age!"

Now Guren started laughing as well, Shinoa smiled and so did most of the others in the circle except Kureto, Mahiru and Mika.

"You sound more like you're 10 years old," Guren stated while still laughing.

"Shut up, stupid Guren!" Yuu yelled angrily.

"Ages aside," Kureto interrupted. "This still doesn't give us a clue of anything."

Guren stopped laughing and nodded. "You're right. There's nothing in his room, nothing in the kitchen, and nothing anywhere else that we can use for anything. The knife is the only lead we have got." At this, he looked to Shinya who was standing next to him.

"There were no fingerprints on the knife either," Shinya said. "I suspect the culprit was using gloves or something like that."

Yuu started sinking into his own thoughts. He had this feeling that the others weren't paying attention to something, that there was something very important they needed to put their focus on. Before he knew it, he said the only thing that came to mind. He opened his mouth

And spoke just in time to interrupt Guren in a sentence.

"Maybe that thing of me lying about my age actually had something to do with it?" he suggested.

The silence that fell in the room after that was deafening until Guren spoke up.

"Then tell us what happened after he discovered that you lied?" he suggested.

Yuu nodded. "Afterwards Shinoa started laughing, not only at me but at Makoto as well. He told her to stop but she claimed that he was stupid and wouldn't stop laughing. It ended up with him telling her to shut up, otherwise he'd kill her," Yuu finalized.

"Well, I was being honest and Makoto-san wasn't serious about that threat," Shinoa said, smiling happily.

"I wouldn't mind if he'd meant it," Yuu said.

"That's mean, Yuu-san," Shinoa said sweetly.

"I wouldn't care," Mika followed up.

"It would be problematic to clean up the mess," Shiho said.

"I get the feeling I'm being treated very unfairly," Shinoa said.

"Maybe you aren't so far of the direction where we need to go," Guren said, looking from Yuu, to Mika, to Shiho. "Is there any one of us who, against all odds, wouldn't want for the girl to die?" he asked.

Everyone fell silent. No one wanted to admit their care for Shinoa, at least not willingly.

"Mahiru," Guren finally broke the silence himself. "Last night, you told me that you felt like there was a connection between you and Shinoa, isn't that right?" he asked.

"I wasn't there at the time," Mahiru said.

"There is that technique they call eavesdropping," Shinya said while smiling. "I do think I'd like to try it, what about you?" he asked.

Mahiru let a frown show on her face, for the first time during this trial, she actually displayed some emotion. There was something about this that even made Yuu certain that they had caught on to something.

"So, Mahiru overheard Makoto threaten Shinoa and thought he was serious, therefore she went ahead and killed him before he could get his hands on Shinoa?" Guren summed up. "It does give a comprehendible motive," he finalized.

"Are we ready for everyone to vote for a suspected culprit?" Ferid asked with a smile. He had been sitting and watching the trial all this time without uttering a word. It hadn't been too boring though.

"Anything to say for yourself, Mahiru?" Kureto asked.

Mahiru said nothing and everyone voted for a culprit.

"I'm happy to share with you that you are completely right. Mahiru did indeed murder Makoto," Ferid concluded. "Any final words before you will be executed?" he then asked.

Mahiru stepped down from her stand and walked up to Shinoa. "I would like to apologize," she said. "If I'd known that Makoto wasn't being serious, this never would've happened and I would've been able to protect you for a bit longer," she said softly while looking up at Shinoa with slightly teary eyes. Then she walked up to stand by a small door that led somewhere else.

"Let's go then." Ferid got down from his own chair and walked up to Mahiru by the door. "You all just go back to whatever you want to do. Perhaps take a shower or something, we do have the facilities, or go in the garden. It should provide you with fresh air despite being underground," he said before opening the door and leading Mahiru out of the trial room.

* * *

 **For the record, Shinoa and Mahiru don't know that they are siblings**

 **Thanks for reading**

 **Jackie**


	4. Daily Love

A few days passed when nothing really happened. Everyone just started making friendships and find their place. Shiho and Sayuri took turns cooking and everyone else enjoyed their food. They all played games in the gaming room or sat and talked somewhere.

Yuu felt like he was getting well along with most. He didn't speak much to Kureto and he fought more with Shiho than he talked with him. He found Shinoa annoying and Guren was treating him like a kid. Aside from that, he got well along with everyone, but he got the best along with Mika.

Everyone was sitting around the table. They had just finished having dinner when the screen was switched on and Ferid's face appeared. He smiled widely as he looked down at them.

"Hello," he said. "I figured you might be getting tired of just sitting around and playing games, so I've prepared a little movie for all of you. Assemble in the media room at 8, that's in about half an hour. I'll see you then," Ferid waved before the screen was switched off again.

"I'd almost forgotten he was even here," Yuu muttered to Mika.

"I hadn't," Mika said.

"Let's hurry up and wash the dishes. I want to watch that movie," Guren said in a demanding tone.

"Didn't we agree that I gave the orders?" Kureto asked coldly.

"Shut up." Guren said.

"Yuu-kun, should we wash the dishes then?" Yoichi asked as he stood up and took his own dishes to carry them to the kitchen.

After the first trial they had all agreed to take turns on doing all the chores. Also washing the dishes was a job they would take turns doing. Today, Yuu and Yoichi shared this task.

Yuu got up. "Sure. Let's get started!" He took his own dishes and started taking it to the kitchen. All the way, Yuu seemed to be very eager to finish up quickly. He was very quick when it came to cleaning and washing the plates. Yoichi had to send back the same plates more than once to ensure that they were cleaned well enough.

"Yuu-kun, can't you see you're not washing the dishes properly?" Yoichi asked.

Yuu looked up. "Am I not?" he asked, confused.

Yoichi held up a plate. There was still some sauce left on it. This one had already been by Yuu twice. "You want to know what Ferid-san is planning too, right?"

Yuu couldn't deny it and nodded. "The faster we're done, the faster we can check it," he said as he sent over another only half-washed plate.

Yoichi nodded as he pushed back both plates. "I think you'll be done a lot faster if you make sure to wash the plates properly?" he suggested.

Yuu nodded, actually getting Yoichi's point and he started washing the dishes more properly. The two finished just before 8 and went to the media room where everyone else was sitting. Yuu looked around and saw that Mika was waving at him. There was an empty seat next to him and another next to that before Shiho's strawberry pink hair could be seen.

Yuu headed up to Mika and sat beside him while Yoichi went to sit between him and Shiho, knowing that they didn't get along well.

"Is everyone here now?" Ferid asked. No one answered so he assumed that meant everyone had arrived and he started explaining. "I've made this movie, a special movie, just for you to watch. I really wanted to show this to you, so you better watch closely. It's a really good movie, in fact, a masterpiece." He smiled. "I hope you enjoy it." He then went to the back of the room to sit and watch the movie with them.

The media room went dark and everyone's eyes fixated on the screen where a movie was now shown. The art was terrible. The characters were stickmen with only their hair-color being different.

The movie told a story of Shiro-sama, who was the king of a country and his beautiful daughter, Princess Kuro-chan. She had plenty of lovers. She had Prince Kiiro-kun, prince Murasaki-kun, prince Pinku-kun, prince Midori-kun and prince Ao-kun. All the princes were madly in love with her but princess Kuro-chan couldn't decide on whom to pick. However, she seemed to favor prince Ao-kun. One day she was kidnapped by the evil Aka-kun who also wanted to marry her.

Certain that he would be able to save princess Kuro-chan whenever he wanted, prince Ao-kun sat down with Shiro-sama and planned the wedding.

Prince Kiiro-kun, prince Murasaki-kun and prince Pinku-kun started discussing on who of them would save princess Kuro-chan. The only one who actually took action was prince Midori-kun who went to Aka-kun's castle to save princess Kuro-chan. He performed this act easily, just by sneaking in, taking Princess Kuro-chan and sneaking back out. Then he ran back to the castle and married princess Kuro-chan.

At the end of the film prince Midori-kun and princess Kuro-chan were shown, holding a little baby with blue hair.

The room then turned dark and the sound of a single person clapping was heard and Ferid walked back up to the front. It was him who'd been clapping as the movie finished. He smiled at all of them.

"I hope this movie was interesting. Thank you for watching." Then he left the room to do whatever a shady character like him normally does. Everyone else left the media room as well, in deep discussion about this boring movie.

"It was a love-story, right?" Yuu asked.

Mika nodded. "It looked like it," he answered.

"I wish I'd been in the movie," Norito said. He was walking up ahead with Shinya, Sayuri, Shigure and Mito. "I would've saved princess Kuro-chan way before that green prince could've done so."

"I highly doubt she'd be willing to marry you though, even if you did," Shiho said as he walked up to the group. The girls and Shinya walked on ahead. They all had an interest in getting to the gaming room and start up some video game.

"And what do you know?" Norito tilted his head. "What is your experience with girls?"

Yoichi, who had been walking with Shiho until now, decided to fall behind to walk with Yuu and Mika instead.

"None, but even I can see that with the way you're acting, you'll never get a girlfriend," Shiho said with a smile on his face. He knew he was provoking Norito and seemed to be enjoying it.

"So, tell me what I'm doing that makes me unable to get a girlfriend," Norito said.

"You are way too fixated on the girls," Shiho said.

Yoichi then ran up to them and grabbed Shiho by the wrist. "Shiho-kun, we should go play some board-game. Mika-kun and Yuu-kun will join us," he said while looking over his shoulder at Mika and Yuu with sort of pleading eyes.

"Sure thing," Yuu said. "But I warn you Shiho, I'm not gonna lose to you!"

Shiho turned to face Yuu fully. "Likewise," he said before the four of them went to the gaming room to find a board-game that they would all want to play. Norito went to join his friends in playing the video game. The little argument between him and Shiho seemed to be long forgotten.

* * *

It had been a few days since Ferid had shown them that stupid movie. It had become late in the afternoon and Yuu was on his way to the kitchen with a teapot and two cops He and Mika had been having tea and talking in his room through most of the night on the day before and Yuu had forgotten to bring back the cups and the pot to the kitchen. Shiho had strictly reminded him of this when he showed up for lunch.

Yuu had remembered it when he entered his room and saw the stuff standing on his table. He had then taken it all and was now on his way to the kitchen with the stuff. He didn't want to ask Mika for help since it had been his own idea to begin with.

When Yuu entered the kitchen, he noticed that it wasn't all empty like he'd hoped. The washing up team was there. Today it was Shigure and Norito who had the duty. Shiho was the one in charge of the kitchen, but also Sayuri was there because she had become good friends with Shigure over the past week.

"You finally brought it," Shiho said coldly as he noticed Yuu as the first one. Everyone else turned their attention towards him. Norito sent him an irritated look, believing he was just bringing them more work.

"I will clean this myself," Yuu promised in response to Norito's glare.

"That's appreciated," Shiho said sharply.

"I don't need you to tell me anything, four-eyes," Yuu snapped.

"And you can't come up with a better insult than that?" Shiho snorted.

"You're so annoying!" Yuu screamed and threw up the teapot and cups in frustration.

"IDIOT!" Shiho yelled as he ran to catch all three things. He only managed to save the teapot before he slipped in a little bit of water that Norito had accidentally spilled on the floor. He fell and slid into the wall with a loud crash to follow.

"Shiho-kun!" Sayuri exclaimed worriedly before running up to him. "Are you okay?" she asked as Shiho sat up. The teacups had both fallen to the floor and shattered. When Shiho saw this, he glared at Yuu.

"How stupid is one allowed to be?" he asked.

Yuu stood speechless. He didn't like Shiho very much, but he hadn't wanted for him to get hurt because of something stupid he'd done. Why did he do this anyway?

"Try standing," Sayuri said while she took the teapot from Shiho and stood up. She reached out a hand to help Shiho back on his feet and he tried standing.

When Yuu noticed the pained expression on his face, he hurried up and took the teapot from Sayuri. He knew he wasn't good with medical treatments and therefore wanted to take the teapot off Sayuri's hands as she could give Shiho the right treatment. He felt guilty for what had happened too.

"It hurts a little," Shiho admitted.

Sayuri nodded and looked to Yuu. "Please go get him a chair, Yuu-kun," she said.

Yuu nodded and went to the dining room to take one of the chairs and bring it to Shiho who sat down on it. Sayuri then went to get a first-aid kit and she then knelt down in front of Shiho.

"I want you to tell me where it hurts," Sayuri told Shiho.

"My ankle I guess," he said. "I can do this myself, Sayuri-san," he said.

"You can't lay a bandage on yourself," she said as she took off his shoe and sock and took a look at his ankle. She put pressure on a few points and then put on a bandage.

Yuu was watching this whole scene in amazement, Shigure looked indifferent and Norito had an expression on his face that Yuu was unable to interpret. He wondered if it was anger, but he didn't think such an expression would appear on anyone's face just from an incident like this.

"I will take over the cooking," Sayuri said when she was done. She then went to get an icepack. "Yuu-kun, please help Shiho-kun to the living room and make sure he rests his ankle. Put the ice on if it hurts, but don't let it stay on all the time. When you take it off, head back here with it," she instructed.

Yuu nodded and went to help Shiho stand, but Shiho ignored his attempt of assistance and stood up on his own.

"I can walk on my own," he said.

"Doesn't it hurt?" Yuu asked.

Shiho shrugged. "Perhaps a little. Walk with me in case something happens and when I'm seated, you just leave me in charge," he demanded.

Yuu nodded. He would admit that he was somewhat happy that he didn't have to spend hours in Shiho's company. He supposed that the others were happy about this too.

The two walked to the living room and Shiho sat down slowly. Yoichi came in from the gaming room and stared with wide eyes as Shiho lifted up his leg and let it rest on a chair while Yuu placed the icepack.

"What happened?" Yoichi asked worriedly.

"I fell," Shiho answered. "Because _some_ Idiot decided to throw a teapot for no good reason."

"I get it!" Yuu yelled. "I'm stupid!"

Silence fell upon the room until a smile broke out on Shiho's face. "Mind repeating that? I want to record it."

"No way!" Yuu yelled before he walked out of the room. He didn't want to be in Shiho's company for another minute he couldn't stand him at all!

* * *

A few days later, Yuu was sitting in his room with Mika again. They were just talking calmly to one another while everyone else was doing whatever.

"Hey Mika?" Yuu asked, claiming Mika's attention. They'd been silent for a little while by now.

"What is it, Yuu?" Mika asked.

"Remember when Mahiru died?" Yuu asked.

"What about it?" Mika asked back.

"Well…" Yuu trailed off. "She said that she felt like there was a special bond or something between her and Shinoa." He said.

"Where are you going with this?" Mika asked.

"I was wondering… I feel like what is between the two of us is different than the bond I have with everyone else so… could it be that we are related or something?" he asked.

"I don't know. There is no questioning that Shinoa and Mahiru are related. Mahiru looked a lot like Shinoa," Mika said.

"Really?" Yuu asked.

Mika sighed. "Yes they do. But we don't look alike so I don't think we are biologically related," he added.

Yuu then started wondering about something. "Say Mika… what do you remember about your family?" he asked.

Mika was about to take in a breath to answer Yuu's question when someone knocked on the door.

Yuu stood up from the bed where both he and Mika were sitting. He headed to the door and opened it and looked outside. There he saw Yoichi.

"Hey Yoichi," Yuu said.

"Yuu-kun," Yoichi said. "I can't find Shiho-kun anywhere." His voice sounded like he was getting really worried.

"I don't know where he is either," Yuu said.

Yoichi nodded. "I know," he said. "But would you please help me look for him anyway?"

"He's probably just in the bathroom," Yuu said, dismissing the issue as nothing.

Yoichi hesitated. "If you say so… But then, won't you stay with me until he shows back up?"

Yuu thought, then he nodded. "Let's go to the gaming room then," he said before stepping out and waving at Mika, signaling for him to come along.

Mika stood from the bed and followed as Yuu and Yoichi led the way to the gaming room. In there, Shinya and Mito were in the middle of starting a round of some game and Yuu decided that he wanted to join in. Also Yoichi and Mika were invited to join by Shinya and lastly Norito came and grabbed a gaming console before they started playing a few rounds of the game. Mito won the first one and Mika won the second one. Then Yoichi put away his console and stood up.

"What's wrong?" Yuu asked.

"I'm gonna go look for Shiho again," Yoichi said.

"Then Guren will take over," Shinya said before putting Yoichi's abandoned console in Guren's hands.

"I never agreed to-" Guren started.

"New game!" Shinya interrupted and started the new game.

They played intensely for a little while. Yuu was very focused. He was determined to win this game no matter what. He wanted to win.

But when they were half-way through, a loud shout was heard from the garden. Yuu recognized the voice right away and tossed his console aside. He stood up and ran out of the gaming room and to the garden.

"Yuu!" Mika yelled behind him.

"What's going on!" Guren yelled as everyone else stood up and followed Yuu. Guren and Norito in the lead.

Yuu came into the garden and stopped just after entering. In front of him was Yoichi who had dropped to his knees. In front of him was Shiho's dead body. He was lying with his face upwards and it was obvious that he was dead.

Now Guren and Norito entered the room, Norito came first, and then Guren followed right after, and as soon as Guren had entered and laid eyes on Shiho's dead body, Ferid's announcement was heard.

* * *

 **Did you recognize something? What I'm talking about is the plot in the movie Ferid shows. If you're curious, go to Ao3 and search for Princess Yuu-chan. I know the amthor name is not mine but Kazumi was with me while I wrote it and we used her profile for publishing. I did exclude one part of the original story though, because I wanted to limit the number of characters in the movie.**

 **Anyways, sorry I didn't publish yesterday. I had it in mind but I had a lot of homework, I had to buy a present for my sister, I had to prepare dinner, play Mystic Messenger (I swear that game is destroying my life and I don't know how to quit it) and I had to read a manga which is gonna take me forever and a half to get through... and I have a graphic novel after that T-T So I'm sorry if I'll forget to update in the future too but I don't have that much time at the moment. I'm lucky I wrote these chapters beforehand, they took about four hours or so to write each.**

 **Thank you for reading both the chapter and my complaints about my life (if you bothered about the last part ^_^)**

 **Jackie**


	5. Deadly Love

"What?" The fact that Shiho had died slowly started to sink into Yuu's head as Shinya and Mito entered the garden as well. Behind them, Shinoa and Mitsuba also came running.

"Who died?" Mitsuba asked.

"Shiho," Guren answered her.

"I didn't think anyone else would die," Shinoa muttered.

"None of us did," Shinya responded.

Yuu walked up to Yoichi and stood next to him. He liked to say he wasn't stupid. He had at least noticed that Yoichi had been around Shiho the most. He was pretty sure they hadn't had the same bond as he and Mika had, but they were close. That couldn't be denied.

"Are you okay?" Yuu asked.

Yoichi looked up and attempted a smile. "I'm fine, thanks for worrying, Yuu-kun," he said.

Sayuri and Shigure then came running with Kureto walking behind them as the last ones and with that, everyone were gathered around in the garden.

"Do we do the same as last time then?" Shinya asked.

"What do you mean?" Guren asked.

"Splitting into groups decided by lot," Shinya answered.

"Can I be with a cute girl this time?" Norito asked.

Shinya smiled. "Let's see what the lots say." He then turned to Guren. "How many groups.

"Five," Kureto answered instead of Guren. "Two in each group and two on guard."

Shinya looked to Guren, as if he wanted to confirm if it was okay. Guren only nodded in response, giving his approval, so Shinya hurried off to make new lots.

Everyone fell silent as they stood and waited for Shinya to return. Yoichi stood up and turned his back on Shiho's corpse. Aside from that, no one really moved around much until Shinya returned and everyone drew a piece of paper from his hand.

Yuu looked at his piece of paper and then up as the others who were starting to form groups. Yoichi had walked up to Guren. Shinoa was smirking at Kureto who didn't bother to look. Shinya smiled at Mito who looked indifferently away. Mika was eyeing Yuu from Mitsuba's side. Sayuri and Shigure had already taken their positions and stood guard over Shiho's body.

"Seriously?" Yuu asked. "I lost the lot again!"

Norito raised an eyebrow. "What?" he asked.

"You're a pain to be with!" Yuu yelled.

"Don't go picking fights!" Guren yelled, cutting through to them. "We need to investigate!"

Yuu sighed, realizing he wasn't gonna get anything done. He may as well just give up.

"Let's go to Shiho's room," Guren said before leading the way to the room. Yoichi followed quickly.

"The kitchen," Kureto demanded before leading the way. Shinoa followed while waving at Yuu with a mocking smirk.

"Ah, that was my idea!" Shinya complained.

"We investigate here!" Norito declared.

Yuu sighed. This translated to that he would be investigating and Norito would be flirting.

"We take… the gaming room?" Mitsuba asked, looking at Mika.

Mika nodded and they walked out of the garden. As they left, Mika turned around and smiled at Yuu.

"Good luck," he said, and Yuu couldn't help but feel like Mika was mocking him too.

"Then…" Shinya had absolutely no idea. "Eh… the… media room?" he asked while looking at Mito.

"Let's go there," Mito said before those too left the garden, letting Yuu, Norito, Sayuri and Shigure alone.

"I'm taking a look around then," Yuu said before heading to a small room in the corner of the garden. He wasn't sure what it was though. A gardener's home?

What he found in there was a dark room. There were gardening tools for most part. There were pots, flower seeds, shovels, spades and a watering-can in a silvery metal. There wasn't really anything interesting or useful in there and Yuu quickly left again.

As he looked further around in the garden he could hear Norito attempting to flirt with both Sayuri and Shigure at the same time.

He looked and noticed a handful of pots standing in a corner. They each held a different flower. Yuu wondered why they were standing all together like that, but he then figured that was how it had probably always been. He hadn't been in the garden before.

"Hey again!" Shinya called as he and Mito entered the garden once more. "There was nothing in the media room so Mito-chan and I decided to come back here and take a look!"

Yuu couldn't help but appreciate it. It wasn't like he thought many clues were left here, but maybe a different set of eyes would notice something.

"Noticed anything?" Shinya asked as he walked up to Yuu. Mito followed him and refused to respond to Norito who attempted to wave her over.

"Nothing, this is a boring place," Yuu said.

Shinya smiled. "Mito-chan, go look at the body and see if there's any evidence. I'll go around and look for other clues with Yuu," Shinya said before grabbing Yuu by the wrist and dragging him along. First he led the way to the place where the pots were and Yuu payed attention to what he was doing, which seemed to be nothing. He just looked at all the pots carefully.

"Yuu," Shinya said. "Do me a favor and check the grass for me."

Yuu rolled his eyes but did as he was told. He didn't have to look far before he found something a bit strange.

"Why is it flat here?" he asked.

Shinya looked up and smiled. "I'll tell you that later. Did you check the shed?" he asked.

"That room over there?" Yuu asked while gesturing towards the place he'd been in before Shinya and Mito returned.

"Exactly," Shinya smiled.

"Yeah, there was nothing," Yuu answered.

"Mind if I take a look?" Shinya asked.

Yuu shook his head. He doubted Shinya would find anything but what did he know. He decided to sit back and just wait until everyone else were done investigating and the trial could begin.

This happened around one and half an hour later when everyone were almost done, thankfully. They were called to the same place as when they were to go to the first trial and then stood and waited for Ferid to show up.

This time, he arrived on the time he had set and smiled at everyone as he appeared. "I hope you figured out something interesting. It seems to be a tricky case," he said before leading the way to the trial room.

Everyone stood in the circle. Now Shiho's, Mahiru's and Makoto's spots were all empty. They all waited until everyone were in place and Ferid called for the trial to begin. Then they started discussing.

"We need a murder weapon, a motive and a culprit." Guren summed up. "Anyone who's got anything?" he asked.

"The file says it was a blunt object," Mitsuba said. "I don't know what that could be."

"It isn't specified," Mika agreed.

"A hammer? Or maybe the table in the garden?" Shinoa asked.

"How much time have you spent in the garden?" Yuu asked.

"Mi-chan goes there a lot, so I just follow to annoy her," Shinoa said.

"I wish you'd stop," Mitsuba said. "And I wish you'd stop calling me Mi-chan too."

"What's wrong with that?" Shinoa smirked. "Mi-chan sounds cute."

"If you two come in the garden sometimes, isn't it right that the pots are scattered a bit around, like on the grass or something?" Shinya asked.

"They usually stand on the grass alongside the path," Mitsuba said with a thoughtful look. "Why?"

"Oh, no reason," Shinya answered with a smile.

"You're annoying," Guren muttered. "Anyone who've got a motive then?"

The question was only met with silence and Guren sighed before glaring at Shinya.

"Spit out that clue," he snapped.

"I was searching in the media room, I don't know anything. Ask Yuu or Norito, they were searching the garden," Shinya said.

"Yuu!" Guren almost yelled. Yuu wasn't affected though.

"The grass was flat at some places… in round circles I think… and the pots were gathered in one corner," he explained.

"I figure the pots were put there to hide the murder weapon," Shinya said. "This means the murder weapon hadn't been removed from the crime scene." He smiled slightly as he met Guren's eyes who responded with irritation.

"Did you find anything?" Guren asked.

"I found a spade, a broken one at that," Shinya said.

"Why would it be broken though?" Sayuri wondered.

"As it would fit the hiding place," Shinya concluded.

"So the spade was the murder weapon," Kureto said. "There is no clue of a motive and then we just need a culprit. And on that note," he turned to Ferid. "I need to ask you something."

"Oh? What may that be, Kureto-kun?" Ferid asked with a wide smile on his face. He looked down at Kureto from his seat.

"What exactly activates the announcement?" Kureto asked.

"The corpse has been discovered by three people. Of course, if the murderer discovers the corpse it doesn't count," Ferid said.

"What made you ask that?" Guren asked.

"I wanted to be sure." Kureto said.

"Well, it gives us another clue," Guren admitted. "I was number four to run in and see the corpse. Yoichi was the first, Yuu was second, Norito was third and after I'd seen it, the announcement came," he finalized.

"Glad that was summed up," Kureto said. "So we've got three suspects."

"I was with Mika at the time," Yuu said.

"I was searching for Shiho," Yoichi said.

"I was in my room and then went to play games with everyone else," Norito said.

"We were all playing games together," Yuu said.

"Well, no one can cover Norito's alibi," Guren said. "What about Yuu?"

"I was with him. We spent all the time in Yuu's room," Mika said. "Yoichi found us there and told us that Shiho was missing," he summarized.

Yuu smiled gratefully at Mika. "So, since Mika is covering my alibi it can only be either Yoichi or Norito, right?" he asked.

Yoichi didn't look to be feeling well as he looked nervously around. Norito also looked strangely uneasy in comparison to what was common for him.

"Was there anywhere in particular you looked for Shiho?" Shinoa asked.

"I looked everywhere," Yoichi said.

"Do we have a specific time of the murder?" Guren then asked.

"When we started guarding, he had been dead for a little more than half an hour," Shigure said.

"A game doesn't take more than 15 minutes at max," Mito said. "We played two with Yuu, Yoichi and Norito, so it all comes down to what they were doing before they started playing games with us."

"Mito-chan's right," Shinya said while smiling.

"As I said, I was in my room with Mika," Yuu said.

"I was in my room alone," Norito said.

"I'm not sure of where I was…" Yoichi said nervously.

"He's the one!" Norito smiled. "Yoichi is the one who murdered Shiho!"

"That doesn't add up!" Yuu exclaimed. "They're friends. When Shiho hit his foot the other day, I helped him to sit in the living room and then Yoichi took over. You wouldn't be so worried about someone if you could kill them so easily only a few days later!"

"Who says he isn't acting?" Norito asked.

"Excuse me…" Sayuri spoke up. "But it didn't seem like acting when he was in the kitchen earlier, looking for Shiho-kun. He said Shiho had been gone for a while now and he was really worried. We had tea and talked for about half an hour. Then I had to cook and advised him to ask Yuu-kun or Shinoa-san if they knew anything. That was about half an hour before the announcement."

"So, Yoichi was at the complete opposite end of this area," Guren defined. "And Sayuri has just given him an alibi… which means," he turned his attention to Norito.

"Why?" Norito asked. "Why are you always siding with everyone other than me? You were with Shiho too! You were with him and gave him your attention while I was there and trying to claim it!" he yelled at Sayuri whose eyes widened.

"I'm sorry…" Sayuri muttered.

"Now that you mention it… didn't we hear them discuss something about Norito never getting a girlfriend right after that Princess Kuro-chan movie?" Yuu asked while looking from Yoichi to Mika and back.

"That's right," Mika said.

"Interesting, so it was jealousy?" Shinoa asked. "And I assume, after Shiho hit his foot, which I heard he did in the kitchen, Sayuri put on a bandage and took care of him for a bit, right?" she asked. "That must've really triggered it."

"How can you know that?" Norito asked. "I just happened to be there! I want to see proof that I'm the culprit!" he yelled.

"Do we have any proof?" Yoichi asked.

"I bet Shiho tried to get Sayuri as his girlfriend and after being turned down he killed himself!" Norito said victoriously.

"He never said anything like that…" Sayuri said nervously.

"Besides," Yuu looked around at everyone. "I may not know Shiho that well, but I'm pretty sure he's not the type of person who would commit suicide, especially not over something like that."

"Yoichi, did Shiho say anything like that when you saw him last?" Guren asked.

"No… he just ended our conversation abruptly," Yoichi answered.

"Abruptly? How?" Kureto asked.

Yoichi looked a little nervous. "He… he said he had to go do something and then just left," he answered.

"Could it be… that he were to meet with someone?" Guren asked. He started fumbling with a pocket by his chest and took out a folded piece of paper.

"What's that?" Yuu asked.

"I found it on the table beside Shiho's bed in his room," Guren said. "It's a note and I'm pretty sure it was delivered by the killer," Guren explained.

"I didn't know of that!" Yoichi exclaimed.

"I didn't tell you," Guren answered.

"What does the note say then?" Mika asked impatiently.

"It says that the receiver shall meet up in the garden at a specific time. This time is set about an hour before the murder occurred."

"I bet it's from Sayuri because she wanted to reject him!" Norito exclaimed.

"Are you still going with that?" Mito asked drily.

"What do you say, Sayuri?" Guren turned the note around as the others could see it. The handwriting was rather clumsy and difficult to read. Yuu had nothing to say though. It didn't look much different from the way he normally wrote.

"No," Sayuri said. "That's not my handwriting," she answered.

"I agree," Guren said. "The writer is obviously male and since the two other suspects have an alibi, it can really only be one person." Guren turned to Norito who was, by this time, lost for words.

"If everything's clear, I want you to cast your votes!" Ferid said while smiling at everyone.

And as such, everyone started casting their votes and Norito was indeed the culprit. Ferid took him away to his execution under loud protests.

"My work here is starting to suck a bit," Ferid muttered as he dragged Norito along. "Maybe I should spice things up a bit for the next round." He smiled as an idea for the next round took form in his head.

* * *

 **Anyways, I don't know what you think, but I personally think this is one of the best cases I wrote. I was really proud, not when I wrote it, but after I had written it and was reading through it I started thinking that it wasn't bad at all. I'll leave the judgement up to you though. If you feel like it, when the story is done, tell me which case you find worked out the best in terms of plot, the way it was written or what characters died.**

 **Random fact: I had a lot of trouble writing people like Narumi, Kimizuki and Goshi by their first names, Makoto, Shiho and Norito respectively. I swear this wasn't planned, but I discovered that within the first two cases they were all dead and gone and I didn't have to think about names or surnames anymore. What a relief.**

 **Remember yesterday when I talked about my hard hard life?** **Turns out I'm starting to see some light through the darkness. I might actually live through this!**

 **Thanks for reading.**

 **Jackie**


	6. Daily Escape

"We are facing a huge problem," Shinya declared on the day after Norito's trial. "After Shiho's death, Sayuri-chan is the only one who is able to cook, so we need one more!"

"It's not that big a deal," Guren said in a relaxed manner.

"Well, if you don't mind starving then go ahead," Shinya said. "But if Sayuri-chan ended up getting killed for one reason or another, then who would take over the cooking?" he asked.

"Personally, I'm up for the idea," Shinoa said.

"Yeah, I don't want to starve!" Yuu said loudly.

"I don't want you to starve either," Sayuri said, thereby making her agreement clear.

"Who of us think they can cook?" Kureto asked, taking the lead of the discussion.

No one rose their hand, in fact they all looked insecurely from one to another until Shinoa raised her hand. However, Mitsuba grabbed her around the wrist and forced her hand back down quickly.

"Why'd you do that, Mi-chan?" Shinoa asked.

"Because you obviously can't cook," Mitsuba answered.

"Then we will have a contest over the next few days," Shinya said. "Everyone cooks. Whoever gets the best result wins," he said.

"Not a bad idea," Kureto agreed.

Guren looked displeased at everyone as this was decided, but he said nothing.

"Okay, we all just go in the order we decide. There is breakfast, lunch and dinner and we are eleven people in total, excluding Sayuri-chan it'll be ten people. We have lunch and dinner today, then breakfast, lunch and dinner on the following two days and breakfast and lunch on the last day. At dinner it's decided." Shinya smiled satisfied at his idea.

"Okay," Shinoa said. "Then I'll go make lunch for today! Mi-chan can be on dinner."

"I can get up to make breakfast," Yoichi suggested.

"I'll take lunch then," Mito said.

"Shigure-chan, will you take dinner?" Shinya asked.

"I can do that," Shigure answered.

"Then Guren'll take breakfast on day two and I'll take lunch," Shinya said. "Kureto can take dinner."

Kureto didn't exactly look like he thought it was something for Shinya to decide, but he had nothing against the decision except it not being made by him, so he said nothing.

"I'll take breakfast then," Yuu said. "Mika, can you make lunch?" he asked.

"There's nothing left besides that," Mika answered with a kind smile.

With that decision in mind, everyone went their separate ways. Some just went to do their usual everyday kind of fun while others went to pray that they would survive the next few days while they were testing cooking skills and abilities.

* * *

When everyone showed up for lunch, the table had already been laid, but what they found was nothing they really found very likable.

"What's this?" Yuu said while fishing up some kind of meat, stuck in a strange sauce.

"It's rice mixed with cheese sauce and chicken marinated in some seasonings I found and cheese sauce," Shinoa said.

"That's… a little cheesy," Yoichi commented.

"You're right," Shinya answered while eating.

Sayuri, Shigure and Mito didn't look much pleased either. Guren and Kureto didn't show any disgust on their faces, but they didn't exactly compliment her food either.

"Well… the rice could have boiled a little more and the chicken is a little too dry," Sayuri said.

"Hey!" Shinya called. "I made this schedule!" He passed a piece of paper around to everyone. There was a box for each person with a name written on it. Underneath were five circles.

"What do we do with these?" Yuu asked.

Shinya smiled. "The circles were supposed to be stars, but I'm not that artistic. You fill out the circles in relation to how good you thought the food was, so if you think Shinoa's cheesy food was very good, then you fill out all five," he smiled, knowing that Yuu would need it spelled out anyway.

"Ah, I get it, so if I think it's shit, then I don't fill out anything?" Yuu asked.

Shinoa smiled. "If you do that, Yuu-san, then I'll give it to you tomorrow for breakfast."

Yuu felt like he was about ready to throw it all back up. "N-no thank you," he said.

* * *

It was a little before dinner time when they all heard a scream from the kitchen. Everyone ran from the gaming room to the kitchen to see what was going on and stopped and stared in horror.

Mitsuba was standing in the middle of the floor with a frying pan with flames on it that reached way above her head. Her facial expression was outright horrified as she stared at the flames.

"Mi-chan!" Shinoa stared at the flames as well.

Shigure pushed past everyone and took the frying pan from Mitsuba before putting it in the sink and turning the water on. The kitchen was soon filled with a mist of damp as the water wiped out the flames.

"How'd you pull that off?" Yuu asked in wonder.

"I've heard that if you add alcohol to the food it should taste better!" Mitsuba exclaimed.

Somehow, Yuu felt like he had heard that remark before, but he didn't comment further on it.

"What do we do about food then?" Yoichi asked.

"I'll take over," Sayuri said. She stepped into the kitchen and Mitsuba went past the others and left with a saddened expression on her face. She wasn't very good at handling that kind of failure it seemed.

"Should we go talk to her?" Yoichi asked while looking at everyone else.

"Mi-chan'll be fine, she just needs some time to herself," Shinoa said.

Accepting this, the others went back to doing whatever they needed to do. Mika and Yuu sat and talked in Mika's room this time for a little while until Yuu decided that he felt bad for Sayuri because she needed to do everything.

"Let's go help her," he told Mika.

"If you say so, Yuu," Mika answered in agreement.

The two then headed back out of Mika's room and down to the kitchen, but just before they turned the corner, Mika grabbed Yuu's arm to stop him. He had heard something.

It didn't take many seconds before Yuu heard it too. Someone was coming down the hallway, someone who was in a really good mood. They were humming some tuneless melody.

Then Ferid turned around the corner. There was a wide smile on his face and he only barely noticed the two, when he did, he just flashed them a smile and waved before walking on ahead.

"What was that about?" Yuu asked.

"I don't know," Mika answered. "But he's creeping me out."

* * *

Yoichi didn't make the most successful breakfast. His rice were overcooked and he had been using sugar instead of salt in all his dishes, which messed most of them up. Aside from that, he didn't do that bad. He had done the best job so far if Yuu had to say so.

Mito didn't do that bad either. She made a few errors that could've been avoided by someone with more skill and she showed her lack of experiences in the kitchen.

Shigure didn't have much experience either, but she had a bit more than Mito, which led to a much more eatable result. But she had a huge problem with timing. The rice and meat ended up getting cold while she was making sauce.

Guren only boiled rice and made sashimi the following morning, which only showed how little he wanted to cook, as a result, he didn't get a very high score either.

Shinya decided to drag Guren along with him to the kitchen and ended up being more focused on teasing him than cooking, and therefore it resulted in the food being burned. He apologized, but didn't score that many points either.

Similar to Mito, Kureto didn't show much experience in the kitchen, in fact he seemed to have absolutely no clue of what to do in a kitchen.

Yuu got up early on the following morning to prepare the best breakfast he had ever made. That was at least what he told Mika when he came to the kitchen to ask what Yuu was doing.

"It's gonna be really good!" Yuu said while putting a spoonful of salt in the pot he had on the cooker in front of him.

Mika hesitated. "If you say so," he then muttered. "What do you want me to make for lunch?" he then asked.

Yuu thought for a bit. "I really like curry, but do you know how to make that, Mika?" he asked.

"I should have an idea," Mika answered. He then left the kitchen to go do something else while waiting for Yuu to finish.

As Mika left, Yuu put another spoonful of salt in the pot.

The huge amount of salt was the biggest complaint he received after serving breakfast for everyone. No one could eat that much because the food had become way too salty. And though both Yuu and Mika attempted to force themselves through the dishes, it proved to be impossible and they had to give up before they were even half-way through.

* * *

At lunch time it was Mika's turn as the final one, and to everyone's joy, he served an almost successful curry. There were a few flaws, among those, the seasoning was a bit off but everything else seemed to be working out okay and overall he was the one who received the best score.

"You're amazing, Mika!" Yuu exclaimed.

Mika didn't respond. He wasn't sure if he should agree or disagree with Yuu's statement.

"Why is that?" he asked.

"You managed to cook something eatable unlike most of us!" Yuu answered truthfully. "I mean, it would've been really bad if you made something like what Shinoa did a few days ago."

"Care to repeat that, Yuu-san?" Shinoa asked.

"Your food suck!" Yuu shot back.

"At least it was eatable," Shinoa argued.

Yuu had nothing to say to that. He knew his had been terrible, but in his opinion, Shinoa's was about just as bad as his was.

"So Mika-kun and I are in charge of cooking now?" Sayuri asked.

"Yeah," Shinya said. "That's how it is, the rest of us simply tried and failed."

From that day on, Mika and Sayuri took turns on cooking. Mika wasn't the most happy about the new work it seemed, but it worked out fine if Yuu went with him to keep him company, so Yuu usually did that.

* * *

About a week passed since the decision of who to cook was made and everything seemed rather peaceful. Mika and Sayuri took turns on cooking while everyone else spent the time playing games or teasing each other.

It was on one of Sayuri's cooking days. It was early in the morning and everyone was up. Normally Sayuri would come call for them at some time between 8 and 9 in the morning, but today it was half past nine before anything happened. Most were still asleep. Mitsuba and Yoichi had decided to play some kind of game. Shigure had gone to shower and Mika and Yuu had gone to the kitchen because Mika needed to see if anything was troubling Sayuri.

"Where is she?" Mika asked as he and Yuu entered the kitchen and saw that it was completely empty. Sayuri hadn't made breakfast, she hadn't even shown up to prepare it, so Mika let out a sigh.

"Yuu," he said while turning to Yuu. "Go look for Sayuri-san. I'll start making breakfast," he informed.

Yuu nodded. "It shouldn't be that hard," he assured as he started heading off.

As Yuu went past the gaming room he heard how Yoichi and Mitsuba were talking over whatever game they were playing.

"I wonder what's up with Shinoa," Mitsuba said. "She didn't answer as I came to her room and she hasn't gotten up yet."

"Do you think…" Yoichi trailed off, not wanting to actually say the words but even Yuu was pretty sure he knew what he was thinking.

"No way!" Mitsuba yelled. "She's too clever for that! I could sooner see her be behind a murder than getting killed."

Yuu decided he had been listening enough to the conversation and started heading on. He was pretty sure Sayuri wasn't in there either.

After a quick trip down the hallway where the rooms were, and a knock on Sayuri's door which wasn't responded, Yuu started heading onward. He was planning to check the garden as the next place. Maybe Sayuri had forgotten that it was her turn to cook today.

"Yuu!" It was Guren who was calling as Yuu went through the open space in front of the trial room on his way to the garden.

"What do you want?" Yuu asked in an annoyed tone.

"Come here," Guren said.

It was only then Yuu noticed that Guren was standing in the doorway to that mysterious room they didn't know what was for originally. The door had just been there and been locked through all this time. Yuu still remembered the end of the first investigation where he, Shigure and Norito had attempted to open that door, but failed.

Yuu then started heading over to where Guren was and stopped when he stood in front of him.

"What is it?" he asked.

"Use polite speech when talking to someone older than you," Guren said.

"Yeah, yeah," Yuu answered, not caring at all about that minor detail.

"And," Guren grabbed Yuu by the wrist, "come in here." He then dragged Yuu through the door and practically pushed him on ahead into the unknown room.

The first thing Yuu saw was a number of unknown instruments. They all looked rather dangerous. If he didn't know better, he'd say this was a torture chamber. In the middle of it all, Shinya was standing with his back turned on Yuu. He seemed to be staring at something, but Yuu couldn't clearly see what it was until he took a few steps closer.

Ferid's announcement then sounded as Yuu laid eyes on Shinoa and Sayuri who were both lying in their own pool of blood.

* * *

 **For this, I'd like to thank my younger sister for helping me coming up with creative ways to ruin food. I know she's not gonna read this, but it feels right to give her some credit.**

 **Thanks for reading**

 **Jackie**


	7. Deadly Escape

"Shi-Shi-Shinoa?" Yuu whispered as he saw the girl he had always found so annoying, lying dead there in one of the machines.

"Not easy to accept, is it?" Shinya asked.

"I wonder what the others will say to this," Yuu responded.

"S-Sayuri?" Shigure was standing in the doorway now, fully dressed, her hair was still a little damp though.

"Why would someone kill Sayuri-san?" Yoichi asked as he too looked into the room. Mitsuba was standing right behind him.

Shinya grabbed Yuu by the arm and pulled him aside as they weren't blocking the view for the others. This caused both Yoichi and Mitsuba to let out loud, shocked sounds as they saw both Shinoa's and Sayuri's bodies.

Mito, Kureto and Mika came as the last ones and they were now all looking at the bodies. No one said a word for around five minutes until Kureto broke the silence.

"Shinya, we'll need some new groups. Two guards, a three-man group and two two-man groups." He said.

"Got it," Shinya responded before heading off to prepare the lots again.

As Shinya was off, the others were silent again. No one dared to speak a word until he had returned and they started drawing lots. All that Yuu could think about, was how relieved he was that he couldn't be put in the same group as Norito again. No offense against the dead, but that had really been a pain.

Luckily for Yuu, he was put in the same group as Mito and Yoichi. He didn't know much about Mito except she was usually the one to start up the video games, but he got very well along with Yoichi, so it was a nice improvement.

Mika had to go investigate with Shigure while Guren and Kureto were tasked with guarding the two bodies. Mitsuba and Shinya were in the same group.

"I was in the middle of preparing breakfast, so I think I should go back to the kitchen and finish that," Mika said. "Also, it might hold clues."

"Then we'll come pick up some breakfast!" Yuu called as Mika and Shigure left the room.

"We could also take a look at their rooms," Yoichi said.

"Whatever you say," Mito answered before she led the way out of the room where Shinoa and Sayuri had been found. Yuu and Yoichi got busy following her lead as they turned down the corner to the hallway where the bedrooms were located. They went a little further down than the middle and stopped outside Shinoa's room.

"We should perhaps split up and take a look at each room in the same time?" Mito suggested. "So, I'll take Shinoa's room and you two take Sayuri's room?" she suggested.

"Wouldn't there be more clues in Shinoa-san's room?" Yoichi asked. "If that's the case, then two should be going there. Don't you think, Mito-san?" he asked.

"Fine," Mito agreed. "If Yoichi-kun searches Sayuri's room and Yuu-kun and I searches Shinoa's room, then it's fine," she said.

"Alright," Yuu said before opening the door to Shinoa's room and entering.

It wasn't until Mito closed the door behind them that Yuu started feeling a little strange. He hadn't been to any of the other rooms except Mika's room. It felt like he was somewhat stepping into Shinoa's private space without her permission.

"Sorry for the intrusion," he therefore said before walking further into the room and taking a quick look around. The room looked pretty similar to his own room. There was a bed, a closet, a desk and a chair and a small table by the bedside. There was also a shelf above the bed for personal belongings. Yuu could easily tell it had never been used. None of them had had any personal belongings with them. The only thing that differed from his own room, aside from the fact that clothes weren't scattered everywhere, was a small, black, notebook that was lying on the desk. A pen was placed next to it.

"You'll take that side and I take this one?" Mito suggested while gesturing to the different sides of the room, giving Yuu the side where the bed was.

"Fine by me," Yuu said before he went to take a look at the bed. He noticed that it didn't exactly look like someone had slept in it recently. The bed was made nicely, and when he looked under the sheets, he saw that Shinoa's pajamas were lying there, neatly folded. Against all Yuu's believes, she kept a tight order in here.

"Have you checked under the bed?" Mito asked.

"Not yet," Yuu answered before looking under the bed. He couldn't see anything aside from darkness and dust. But then his eyes caught sight of something a little brighter. Something that had fallen down there recently.

"I'll get going for a bit," Mito said. "There's something I need to check."

"Fine," Yuu answered.

Mito then left and Yuu picked up the brighter object and learned it was a piece of paper. It looked like a note. He looked at it carefully.

"Potential victims?" he read aloud to himself. He then looked down the list and saw all the names of those who were alive except Sayuri and Shinoa.

Figuring that it was best to keep this and take it to the trial, Yuu stuffed it in this pocket. He then turned around to look at the rest of the room and noticed that black notebook on Shinoa's table. He noticed that it was now open on a particular page.

"What's this?" Yuu asked while looking through the book. "A diary?" he asked while looking briefly at the text in the book.

"Yuu-kun, Mito-san?" Yoichi was calling from the hallway.

"One moment!" Yuu called back.

Yoichi came into the room and looked around. "Where's Mito-san?" he asked.

"She left, I don't know where to," Yuu said while flipping through the pages. He stopped once the text in the book stopped and flipped back to where the last page was.

"Is this a diary?" Yoichi asked as he looked over Yuu's shoulder. "Why is the page torn like that?" he then asked.

"Torn?" Yuu asked.

"There," Yoichi pointed to a small piece of paper, stuck in the middle of the book. "It's like someone tore out a page they didn't want others to see."

"Should we bring this book along?" Yoichi asked.

Yuu looked at the book. "Maybe?" he asked.

Yoichi then closed the book and put it under his shirt to keep it hidden. It was probably best that no one knew that they had found it until the trial. That was what he gave as reasoning and Yuu could only agree.

It wasn't long after that when Ferid announced that the trial would soon begin and they all headed to the open space outside the room where they had found Shinoa and Sayuri. Ferid stood there already as everyone showed up. Mito showed up in the same time as Mika and Shigure.

"Everyone here?" Ferid asked. He didn't wait for an answer before he continued. "Good, then let's get this trial started!" he chuckled as he led the way through the doors and to the trial room.

Everyone else followed him without much hesitation. Yuu kept a hand on his pocket to ensure that his little piece of evidence was safely in place.

Yuu looked across from him. There was Ferid, with an amused smile on his face as he watched them all. Yuu had a bad feeling as he looked at him. It felt like Ferid had had a hand in this, but he couldn't explain how this could be.

Next to Ferid was Guren, who was looking as serious as ever. Shinya was standing next to him with a smile on his face. Two stands away from Shinya was Yoichi, between them was Makoto's empty stand. Yoichi was looking a little nervous but Yuu figured it was because he actually had some clear evidence to show for this trial. Then Norito's empty stand was there before Shigure was standing there with a serious expression on her face. It was much similar to Guren's expression, but a little softer.

Between Shigure and Yuu was Shinoa's empty stand. Yuu could still see her standing there with that sassy smirk on her face. On Yuu's other side was Mika who, for some unknown reason, refused to look Yuu directly in the eyes. On his other side was Sayuri's empty stand before Shiho's was there, and afterwards, it was Mahiru's empty stand. It wasn't until then that Mito was standing there, also with a serious expression, and same for Mitsuba. Finally, next to Mitsuba was Kureto who also had a hard and serious expression. This was much harder than Guren's though. Yuu's gaze then turned back to Ferid's smile.

"Now," Ferid said. "Let's begin the trial of this double murder."

"The victims are Sayuri and Shinoa," Kureto began. "They were discovered in the room that has been locked until recently. We have learned it is a torture chamber."

"Like that wasn't obvious," Guren said.

"How's it obvious?" Yuu asked.

"You saw all the instruments, right?" Guren asked. "They are all used for some kind of torture, either one way or another."

Yuu nodded. "I see," he said, even though he wasn't really sure that he did.

"I was wondering how they died," Shinya said.

"Anything could be possible," Kureto said. "It is a torture chamber after all."

"They were most likely stabbed to death. If it was from one of the torture instruments or something else is not sure," Guren said. "As for their time of death, it is safe to say that they died around midnight last night. They'd been dead for a while when we found them."

"That's really bad…" Mitsuba said.

"We should do our best to find the culprit as fast as possible," Mitsuba said.

"Yeah," Guren nodded. "What did you all figure out?" he asked.

"Nothing special," Shigure answered.

"Agreed," Shinya said. "Mitsuba-chan and I checked the gaming room and the garden because Mitsuba-chan said it was the places where you were the most likely to run into Shinoa-chan."

"But they held no clues," Mitsuba said.

"Neither did Sayuri-san's room," Yoichi said.

"The door to the torture chamber looked a little off when I first saw it," Shinya said. "Do you remember, Guren?" he asked.

"Yeah, I do," Guren said.

"How did you discover the bodies anyway?" Shigure asked.

"It's rather simple," Shinya said. "Guren and I were chatting and talked about why we couldn't get inside that mysterious room, then we went to see if we could enter and discovered that the door handle looked off, like it had been broken. I then pulled it open, and it worked, and then first I, and then Guren found their bodies. Then Guren saw Yuu passing by and called him over, and when he saw the bodies, the announcement was made," Shinya explained.

"I see," Mito said.

"But how did they get in?" Yuu asked.

"Maybe the killer brought them there?" Yoichi asked.

"But how did the killer get access?" Mika asked in wonder.

"Maybe they were helped by someone?" Mito suggested.

"Who would that be?" Kureto asked.

"Oh, I don't know, maybe that smirking guy with those odd red eyes over there," she gestured towards Ferid whose smile only widened.

"Is that true?" Guren asked.

"Who can say?" Ferid smiled even wider as he looked around. "Do you have a suspect, Mito-chan?" he asked.

"In fact I do, I'm pretty sure I know who the culprit is," Mito declared.

"Who?" Everyone looked to Mito who seemed somewhat happy to get the full attention.

"Mika," Mito answered while smiling, her eyes were fixated on Mika who looked back with surprised eyes. Yuu stared at him too with evenly surprised eyes.

"Why do you suspect me?" Mika asked, seeming calm as he started talking. Nothing in his body language indicated his feelings about being accused for this murder.

"You were talking to Ferid while being in the kitchen. I'm pretty sure you were asking him not to mention your involvement. If I'm not mistaken, you are also the mastermind behind this entire game," Mito kept on accusing. "You abducted Shinoa and Sayuri from their rooms, brought them to the torture chamber and tortured them to death, isn't that right?" she asked.

"I am not involved in this case," Mika said. "I didn't ask Ferid to open the torture chamber for me either. Neither did the killer, I'm sure of that."

"Who else would have done it?" Mito asked. "Why would you lie when the proof is right there. I saw you speaking to Ferid in the kitchen while we were supposed to investigate. Shigure wasn't there either, so what was that all about?" she asked.

"I was asking about his involvement in this case. Starting from the day when we began our cooking contest I have seen him a couple of times and he has been in an exceptionally good mood. I was simply asking for the reasoning," Mika explained.

"Then who opened the torture chamber and brought the victims in there?" Mito asked.

"Do you think the killer brought them there?" Yuu said. "I mean, they could've walked in there on their own…" he trailed off, but the entire room had fallen silent.

"Why would they do that?" Guren asked.

"I don't know, maybe to plan something or something?" Yuu asked.

"What would that be?" Yoichi asked.

"I'm pretty sure they were planning a murder, weren't they, Mika?" Mito asked.

Mika glared at her. "How would I know?" he asked.

"If she says it like that, you should have some evidence on you, right?" Guren asked. "Yuu, check him, all pockets, all clothes, don't let a single spot escape your attention," he demanded.

Yuu looked worriedly at Mika as he went to do as he had been told. Mika willingly let him do it and Yuu got started on his search. He didn't get further than to a pocket in Mika's pants when he found a folded and torn piece of paper. He took it out and held it up. "I found this," he said.

Mika looked at the piece of paper like it was the first time he had seen it. Then he nodded. "Do you want to search more?" he asked.

"This'll do for now," Guren said while waving Yuu over. The younger boy quickly obeyed orders and walked up to Guren with the folded paper. Then he returned to his stand next to Mika.

Guren unfolded the paper and quickly read it through. Then he looked up.

"This looks like a piece of a diary," he said. "It is Shinoa's, I'm pretty sure of that, and she was planning to meet up with Sayuri in the torture chamber. This proves Yuu's theory right." He said.

"He must have gotten it from Shinoa's body," Mito said.

"Why would she bring this with her though?" Shinya asked while also looking at the piece of paper. "What about fingerprints, Guren?" he asked.

Guren nodded and got out a small container with some white powder. He put it on the paper and got most of it away as the fingerprints were revealed.

"On this side there are two different fingerprints. One type from the writer, and one from someone else," Guren said. Then he flipped the paper to the backside and did the same thing. "Here there are also two types of fingerprints. I'm pretty sure the fewer ones are from Yuu. The other ones matches the ones that weren't from the writer," he said.

"Could that be Mika-kun's?" Yoichi asked.

"There's only one way to figure that out," Guren said before he walked up to Mika and asked him to place one finger on the paper and when that was done, Guren added the powder.

"So?" Yuu leaned over to take a look.

"The fingerprints do not match," Guren answered as he headed back to his own stand. "There are no fingerprints on this paper that matches Mika's."

"So if it wasn't Mika, then who could it be?" Mitsuba asked.

"I found this," Yuu pulled out his piece of paper, the one he had found. "I found this under Shinoa's bed. It's a list of potential victims of something," he continued. "It has all our names on it except Shinoa's and Sayuri's."

"Could I see that, Yuu-kun?" Yoichi asked while pulling out the diary from his shirt. "We found this too in Shinoa's room," he explained. "Maybe what Yuu-kun found under Shinoa's bed is the page that was torn from here?"

Yuu passed his list to Shigure who passed it along to Yoichi. He opened the black notebook on the torn page and tried to make the note fit and then he looked up.

"This is not the page," he said then.

"Try this then," Guren handed the note they had found on Mika to Shinya, who handed it to Yoichi. He had this fit in the notebook too and looked up. "This is the right page," he said.

"It also makes sense," Kureto said. "The writing simulated that of a diary, right? And the notebook is Shinoa's diary."

"True," Guren agreed. "If my deductions are correct, Shinoa and Sayuri probably planned to kill someone and decided to meet in the torture chamber. However, they were discovered by their victim who decided to kill them instead," he said.

"By torture?" Mito asked.

"No," Guren said. "Torture is very unlikely despite the location. What I would say is that they were stabbed to death. There were no other injuries.

"But then, what was the murder weapon?" Shigure asked.

"A simple knife," Kureto said. "We found it on Sayuri's body in its sheath." He explained.

"After what we have learned, it's not that impossible," Mika said with a thoughtful look.

"Then, all that is left is to figure out who they had planned as their victim and the case will be solved?" Yoichi asked.

"Looks like it," Shinya agreed in a relaxed manner.

"What does the victim list say?" Guren asked, looking at Yoichi.

"I sent it back to Yuu-kun," Yoichi said while looking over at Yuu who indeed had gotten the list in his hand by now. He was looking at it carefully.

"There is a mark by Mito's name… could it be her?" he asked.

"Were they planning to kill me?" Mito asked in shock.

"And what would you do if they were and you walked in on them?" Guren asked.

Mito looked confused. "I… I would… try to prevent it?" she asked.

"By killing them?" Guren asked.

"No-no, I would find another way to do it," Mito said nervously.

"If I remember, you were also eager to accuse Mika as being the culprit," Guren said.

"I'm still pretty sure he is. He could have used gloves with another type of fingerprints on them?" Mito said, attempting to defend herself.

"And how does gloves leave fingerprints?" Guren asked back. "Speaking of…" he went and took the torn page from Shinoa's diary out of Yoichi's hand before walking up to Mito with the page and his powder. "If you really are innocent, Mito, then you will leave your fingerprint on this paper and let me see if it matches."

Mito looked very uncomfortable as Guren demanded this of her, but she said nothing and quickly gave up. Then she did was she had been told to doo and Guren revealed the fingerprint.

"It was yours," he said before heading back. "Do you confess?" he asked once he was back at his stand.

Mito hesitated, and then she nodded. "Yes, I confess," she said.

"Bravo!" Ferid said with a wide smile. He clapped his hands as the only one in the circle. "And she was really making it difficult by finding a last-minute scapegoat in Mika-kun. Good work indeed. Now, because I can't hold my tongue, I'd like to explain how I'm involved in this case as well," he smiled as everyone glared at him. None of them knew on this involvement, not even Mito it seemed.

"How are you involved?" Guren asked.

"Simple," Ferid said. "I found Sayuri-chan in the kitchen one day and told her that if she successfully killed one person she could get out of here along with the person she loved the most. This had her thinking and while she was doing so, Shinoa-chan accidentally walked in on her and decided that she wanted to help her. They agreed to think things through and then they met up at the torture chamber. I had, beforehand, told Sayuri-chan a way to open the door, but it left a mark. By chance, the victim they were talking about who had been making nightly visits to the gaming room lately, for practice, walked by and overheard their plans. She then decided to kill them both." Ferid smiled even wider as he finished his tale.

"Glad you came clean about it," Guren said. "But no more schemes." His voice was cold and sharp as he made this demand of Ferid.

"No, no," Ferid said in a sing-song voice. "Anyways, we should vote." He said.

Everyone voted and as they had all expected and learned, Mito was the culprit behind it all and Ferid took her away for the execution with a wide grin on his face.

"See you later," he said while waving. Everyone else was just left standing as Ferid dragged Mito off to her execution.


	8. Daily Plot

"Yuu!"

"What?"

Yuu turned in the hallway. He had been on his way down towards the kitchen where Mika was at. He spent all his time down there it seemed. But he did have an excuse since he was the only one who could make something eatable.

The one who had been claiming Yuu's attention and stopped him from walking was Guren, whose head had popped out from the door leading to a room where Yuu had never been. It was between the media room and the living room. If he remembered correctly, the others had said there was a library here, and this was the only room he hadn't been in, aside from the girl's shower room, so he presumed this was the library.

"Come here," Guren demanded of Yuu while gesturing towards him.

"Why?" Yuu asked. "Why do I need to do anything you say?"

"Because I need to talk to you," Guren said while letting out an irritated sound. He then went to pull Yuu into the library and closed the door behind him.

"What's this about?" Yuu asked.

"I want to ask you a few questions," Guren said, seriously.

"About what?" Yuu answered while heading further into that room full of strange books.

"Do you remember the trials we have had so far?" Guren asked. He too walked into the room, past Yuu and to a table with a chair on either side of it.

"Of course I do," Yuu answered while following Guren.

"Do you?" Guren sat down on one of the chairs and signaled for Yuu to sit down on the other one. "Tell me then, who was murdered, how, and who killed them," he demanded.

Yuu frowned. He could be talking to Mika about something fun by now. Why did he need to sit here and talk with Guren about something he knew everything about already?

"First, Makoto was stabbed through the stomach by Mahiru in the hallway with bedrooms, outside Shinoa's room. The second case was about Shiho, who had been hit in the head with a blunt object by Norito in the garden. The third case was Shinoa and Sayuri who were both stabbed to death in the torture chamber by Mito," Yuu explained all three cases as quickly as he could.

"I'm glad we're on the same page," Guren said while getting up. "Were there any suspects in the different cases and how did we prove if they were guilty or not?" he asked.

"In Makoto's case… I don't recall there were any other suspects but we determined that Mahiru was the culprit because she was the only one who would want to protect Shinoa. In Norito's case both Yoichi and I were suspects as well. Both of us had an alibi that was confirmed by others and no good reason to murder him. As for the third case, Mika was called out as a suspect but we cleared him because his fingerprints weren't on the page we had found in his pocket, coming from Shinoa's diary," Yuu answered while Guren walked around in the library to pick up books from various different shelves.

"It seems you aren't as dumb as I thought…" Guren mumbled while picking up another book and turning to face Yuu.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Yuu snapped, feeling like he was being insulted, but he wasn't really sure if that was the case.

Guren didn't answer. He just walked up to Yuu and placed all the books he had gathered on his side of the table. Then he looked directly at Yuu. "Read these and write down whatever you find that matches the cases we have had so far. The books are all about ways to investigate."

"Why do I have to do it?" Yuu asked irritated.

"Because you're the one who gets the least of what's going on in this situation," Guren answered.

"I get it just as well as everyone else, stupid Guren!" Yuu yelled.

"And you need to yell this to the world for what reason?" Guren asked. "Read the books,"

"I can't read," Yuu answered.

Guren smiled and turned on his heel. "Then you'll just have to learn that too. I'm not letting you out before you're done," he said before leaving the library. Yuu then had to sit and read the books and do exactly as Guren had told him. It wasn't even a joke. He really couldn't read that well.

* * *

A few days later, Shinya had arranged a game of Old Maid. He had asked Mitsuba and Yoichi to join him in this and he seemed to be in a good mood despite the fact that it looked like Mitsuba was about to win.

The three of them were sitting in the gaming room with the door to the hallway open as they could see whoever came by outside.

"Have you guys noticed that Yuu-kun hasn't come out for any meals lately?" Mitsuba asked while drawing a card from Shinya's hand.

"Guren's acting weird too," Shinya said while looking at his cards to see which one Mitsuba had taken. "I wonder what's up with all this,"

A thought hit Yoichi's head as he turned towards Mitsuba, ready to draw one of her cards.

"What if… What if Guren-san killed Yuu-kun?" he asked worriedly.

Shinya chuckled. "I highly doubt that. Think about it. If Guren killed Yuu, what would he gain except a ticket out of here? But since no one have discovered a body no one can be dead," he said.

Yoichi nodded, knowing that Shinya was right. What was the point of hiding a body if the point of the game was to deceive everyone else and convince them that you hadn't committed a murder?

"I understand your concern though," Shinya continued. "If Guren went missing for a few days I might also think that he'd been killed or something like that. That is, if I didn't know he wouldn't let that happen,"

"What are you talking about?"

All their heads turned towards the doorway where Guren was standing. He was looking coolly at them as they stared back at him for no good reason.

"We were talking about how we would worry if someone close to us went missing and how we might fear that they'd been murdered," Shinya explained.

"Why?" Guren asked.

"Yoichi-kun was worried since Yuu had been missing for a few days," Shinya answered.

Guren's gaze landed on Yoichi who froze on his chair. He had a feeling he had done something wrong, but he couldn't tell what it was.

"If you want to be sure that he's okay and that I didn't kill him, you can come along, but don't say a word," Guren demanded.

"Now?" Yoichi asked.

"When else would it be?" Guren asked.

"Can I come too?" Shinya asked as Yoichi placed his cards face down and went to follow Guren.

"No, you won't be able to shut up anyway," Guren said as he left the room, Yoichi following right behind him.

They walked further down the hallway and past the living room, not stopping until they'd reached the entrance to the library. Guren opened the door slowly and entered the library. Yoichi followed right behind him, wondering what was happening.

They walked in and Guren stopped once they reached the end of some shelves and signaled for Yoichi to come closer. The shorter boy moved ahead and peeked around the corner of the shelves to see a table with a lamp turned on. Next to the lamp was a stack of books. Under the light of the lamp was another book, which Yuu was reading concentrated. Next to him was a piece of paper and a pencil. On the paper were some clumsily written symbols and Yoichi looked up at Guren.

"What's he doing?" he asked.

"Collecting the intelligence he doesn't have," Guren answered, also in a whisper. "Go," he then demanded and Yoichi left the library without making a sound.

* * *

"He hasn't come out for a while," Ferid said, smiling widely, knowing that his statement was right.

The other didn't answer, just continued with what he was doing while ignoring Ferid's presence as best as he could.

"One would think he had died. Do you?" Ferid asked.

"Why would I tell you?" the other answered.

Ferid laughed. "Of course you wouldn't. That's just the person you are," he continued on smiling as he walked around in the area behind the other person. None of them said a word for a little while.

"You are worried though," Ferid finally said. The other chose not to respond and this only caused a laugh to escape Ferid as he left the other to himself.

* * *

"What's this?!" Yuu yelled as Guren closed the door to the shower room. He had finally completed his task, read all the books and taken notes with clear references to all the different cases they'd been through for the past small month.

"What's what?" Guren asked in a lethargic tone.

"I finally finish all that hard work and then you just bring me here to take a bath!" Yuu yelled.

"We're not just going to take a bath," Guren answered while pulling off his shirt. "We are going to do a body examination," he said.

"A what?" Yuu asked, not comprehending Guren's words.

"A body examination. You read about those," Guren reminded him. "You're going to perform one on me," Guren told him.

"Like hell I am," Yuu snapped.

"You are. There's no option," Guren told him. "We'll bathe afterwards. Take off your own clothes," he said while undoing his pants.

But as Yuu started to take off his own clothes, the door opened. Yuu, who had his shirt over the head at the time, couldn't see the ones entering until it was removed, and then his vision was covered with blonde hair.

"Yuu!" Mika exclaimed. "I was really worried!"

"Yuu-kun's back," Yuu could hear Yoichi comment happily in the background.

"Relax Mika, nothing happened," Yuu said while attempting to get away from Mika's tight hug.

"Where've you been?" Mika asked as he allowed himself to pull slightly away from Yuu and look him in the face.

Yuu looked over at Guren for a clue if he could answer honestly or not. Guren shook his head. Yuu didn't know why though. It seemed he couldn't tell the truth, but he didn't want to lie to Mika of all people.

"Somehow, Stupid Guren found out I couldn't read and locked me up in the library until I could," Yuu answered.

"You're not that smart either, Yuu," Mika said as he completely let go of Yuu and turned to the bench. He too started taking off his clothes, and so did Yoichi.

"Are you two going to take a bath?" Guren asked.

"What else would we do here?" Mika asked coldly.

Before anyone knew it, the door opened again and Shinya entered with Kureto in toe he smiled as he saw everyone and smiled and waved.

"Is there a party out here?" he asked.

"No," Guren answered. "It's by chance," he said.

"Then we'll join," Shinya said.

And so, all six male ended up bathing together. Yuu and Yoichi upheld a lively conversation and Yuu included Mika from time to time. Shinya was also talking to both Guren and Kureto. But while they were bathing and talking, Yuu couldn't help but keep on staring at Guren. He wondered if he had wanted to accomplish something with this, but it seemed he wouldn't get an answer. He ended up leaving the shower room with Yoichi and Mika and the three of them stayed in the kitchen until it was time for them to have dinner.

* * *

It had already been a few days since Yuu had shown up again. He and Mika were sitting in his room around nighttime. They had been talking for a few hours now and everything felt like it was going well.

"You don't mean that you spent all that time learning how to read," Mika said suddenly.

"Why do you ask?" Yuu asked.

"Unlike you, I'm not stupid. I saw you read during the last trial," Mika answered.

"I'm not that good…" Yuu tried.

Mika sighed. "Next time you want to lie, don't make it obvious," he said while turning away from Yuu.

Yuu could sense that Mika wasn't happy with him. He had to do something to lift the mood, but what? All he could come up with was being stupid and childish. Therefore he leaned up against Mika and rested his head on his shoulder.

"Sorry,"

"It's okay," Mika answered. "Just don't do it again, Yuu. I want to trust you,"

Yuu sat up. "You trust me?"

"Friends and family trust one another. They're also honest when speaking to each other." Mika said.

"In what way?" Yuu asked.

"When I say that you stink and should go shower, I'm being honest," Mika answered.

"I do?" Yuu stared at Mika with wide eyes.

"Yes," Mika covered his nose to indicate his point. Yuu felt provoked.

"Okay! I'll bathe!" Yuu said.

"I'll come with you then," Mika smiled and got up to collect his things. Yuu also went to collect his things and prepare to go to the bathroom.

They entered together while Yuu was talking about something completely random that had happened while he, Shinya, Shigure, Mitsuba and Yoichi were playing a video game earlier that same day.

"It sounds like you're having a lot of fun," Mika said as they entered the room and dumped their towels on the bench.

"We do," Yuu said, also dropping his towel on the bench. Then he stopped in his tracks. "Mika… can you hear water running?" he asked.

"Yeah, and I smell something," Mika answered.

Yuu turned to the bathing part of the bathroom and walked closer to it. Mika followed right behind him. They walked slowly until the entire room was in sight and they could see the source of both the sound and the scent.

The water had been turned on and was running down on a limp hand, lying on the floor. The hand was part of an arm that was part of the body, lying lifeless on the floor with an open wound in the back. The person was lying face down, but Yuu had no trouble finding out who it was anyway.

"It… it can't be!" he yelled.

"Yuu?" Mika had also realized who it was and was now getting worried about how Yuu might react for the next little while. What would this do to him?


	9. Deadly Plot

It was Mika who figured they had to find someone else as the announcement could be made. He grabbed Yuu by the wrist and pulled it slightly to claim Yuu's attention.

"We have to find someone," he said.

Yuu seemed to take some time to realize what Mika was talking about before he nodded his head.

"You're right," he answered and followed Mika out of the bathroom.

Luck was on their side. As they exited the bathroom they almost ran directly into Shigure who was on the way to her room to go to bed. At first she refused to come with them, but when Mika told her that they had found Guren's dead body, she was willing to come along. With nervous steps she entered the bathroom and then laid eyes on Guren's body. It was then they heard the announcement.

"I will go inform where we are," Shigure said, not really feeling comfortable about being in the room. It was understandable. She was a woman and this was the males' bathroom.

Shortly after, she had returned, with Shinya Kureto, Yoichi and Mitsuba right behind her and they all took a look at the body lying in the room.

"So… who is doing what?" Shinya asked in a slightly shaky voice.

"We should draw lots like we always do," Yoichi answered. Shinya seemed to have forgotten that.

"Right," Shinya left to prepare them and then returned.

"We're in the same group," Yoichi looked between Mitsuba and Mika as he held his paper with the little 1 written on it. Mika and Mitsuba also both holding up theirs.

"Shinya and I are another group," Kureto said.

Yuu looked down at his blank paper and then up at Shigure. "Guess we're on guard," he said only making a half-hearted attempt at sounding optimistic.

"We will check Guren's room," Kureto said before half dragging Shinya out of the room. The other male was quick to follow though.

"Let's check the library," Yoichi suggested while looking between Mika and Mitsuba.

"Why there?" Mitsuba asked.

"Guren-san spent some time there with Yuu-kun not so long before he died," Yoichi answered.

"Then we should take a look," Mika agreed and took the lead out of the rom. Mitsuba and Yoichi followed, leaving Yuu and Shigure alone in the bathroom.

"What should we do then?" Yuu asked, looking at Shigure.

"Investigate the room," Shigure said while taking a look at the rest of the room except Guren's body. She had good reason. He was completely undressed. Yuu had noticed his clothes lying on the bench the second time he had been in the changing room with Mika while they were waiting for Shigure to bring the others.

It looked like Shigure intended on looking at the rest of the room all on her own, so Yuu decided to try out that method Guren had taught him. Body examination was something he had read about in one of the books Guren had found for him in the library. He hadn't been able to understand all of it, but he had gotten a grasp of what it was all about.

Therefore, Yuu now knelt down beside Guren's body to check every little bit of it and see if there was anything about it that no one else would notice. However there was nothing. The only slight difference was a hint of some black lines on Guren's palm. But it was on the hand that was in the running water so Yuu couldn't see what the lines were supposed to mean. He tried making a small sketch though.

"What are you doing?" Shigure asked, having noticed that Yuu was bent over Guren's hand.

"I found some line's on his palm but the water has almost washed them away," Yuu answered showing her the sketch he had made of them.

"I see," she studied it.

Yuu continued to examine Guren's body for a little longer. Not long after that, Ferid announced that they were going to meet up in front of the trial room to have the fourth trial that would decide Guren's murderer.

Everyone showed up just around the same time. Shinya was standing to himself, being awfully quiet for his character. Mika walked up to Yuu as the first thing while Yoichi and Mitsuba were exchanging slightly nervous looks. Yuu noticed all this but wasn't sure what it was all supposed to mean.

"Is everyone here?" Ferid asked, smiling widely like a cat in front of seven mice.

"We're ready," Kureto answered. Without anyone saying it, he had somewhat become the leader and the one to fill in Guren's place after his death. But it was somewhat a given since he had been the one with second to most influence.

"Then let's begin the trial," Ferid said while leading the way into the trial room. Everyone else followed and took their stand while Ferid was in his seat.

"Okay," Kureto said once everyone was in place. "I want to begin this case by asking everyone where and when they saw Guren last"

"In the dining room at dinner," Yoichi answered.

"Same here," Mitsuba followed up.

"Right after dinner, he was teasing me about something," Yuu answered.

"I was with Yuu at the time," Mika answered.

"I saw him at dinner time," Shigure said.

"I saw him about half an hour or so after dinner and asked him to play Shougi with me," Shinya answered.

"And I saw him at dinner time," Kureto finished off. He looked to Shinya. "What did he say when you asked him to play Shougi with you?"

"Nothing," Shinya answered. "He declined and said he had something else to attend to."

"One of us is telling a lie," Kureto said. "The question is who." He turned back to Shinya. "Was there anyone else around when you asked him?" he asked.

"No," Shinya answered. "But why are you asking me so many questions. Do you suspect me of killing Guren?" he asked.

"Yes, in fact I do," Kureto answered calmly. "Don't deny it. I know I'm on the right track," he was smirking as he spoke.

"I'm not entirely convinced," Yuu said. "At least not without any evidence to back up the statement. So instead of discussing who did it we could… discuss the murder weapon? Anyone who found anything?" he asked.

"You examined the body, what did you conclude?" Shigure asked, looking at Yuu.

"Eh…" Yuu scratched the back of his neck while thinking long and hard. "There was a deep stabbing wound in his back, as from a sharp object of some sort. Possibly a knife if I'd have to take a guess," Yuu finally concluded.

"Anyone who found a knife?" Shigure asked.

"Mika-kun says he found a knife in the library," Yoichi said.

"It was hidden in one of the chairs," Mika continued the explanation. "I could smell the blood so that's how I found it," he said.

"And then we all went to the kitchen," Mitsuba continued the story. "As we'd suspected, it was taken from there and that's about it.

"We borrowed the fingerprint powder from Guren-san's room," Yoichi said. "But there were no results at all. The murderer was probably wearing gloves while committing his crime," he said.

"This is getting us nowhere." Shigure then said. "Why would anyone want to murder Guren and how could they even do it?"

"Guren is one of the smartest of us," Shinya said. "He has been the leading figure in regards of solving all the other cases we have had so far. I can't really see a reason as to why, nor a way to lure him into a place where he could be killed,"

"Unless it was the culprit's goal?" Yuu suggested.

"It could very well be," Mitsuba said. "So the culprit wanted to simply get Guren out of the way to be able to get away with the murder," she summarized.

"It would be a perfect plan," Yoichi said. "And if they are also one of the smartest it would be easy to fool the rest of us and set a trap."

"Which means we have to pin-point the other leading figure throughout the past three cases," Mika concluded.

"Aside from Guren it was probably Shinya and myself who were solving the most," Kureto said.

"I helped too!" Yuu yelled.

"We all know you're too stupid to pull off something like that, Yuu," Mika said while smiling.

"What's that supposed to mean, Mika?!" Yuu yelled.

"Nothing," Mika smiled innocently at Yuu who didn't want to let himself be fooled. He knew it wasn't nothing but he would have to let it slide. Both because he knew it was just friendly teasing and because this was neither the time nor the place for childish stuff like this.

"As for how," Shigure continued once everyone else had fallen silent. "I'm pretty sure that for someone who is as close to Guren as Shinya, it would only make things even easier. You would just have to ask him to go with you to bathe and he would go."

Everyone then turned to look at Shinya who was staring back at all of them. He attempted to open his mouth and speak but not a word came out.

"You're not even smiling," Kureto said. "Was that just a mask?" he asked.

"No," Shinya managed to say. "It's just easier to smile," and as such, he pulled on that characteristic smile of his and looked at everyone. "I didn't kill Guren," he said.

"No one is buying it while you're smiling," Mitsuba said.

Mika nodded his head with a cold expression.

Yoichi looked nervously at Shinya.

"But I said it," Shinya exclaimed. "Yoichi, you remember right? I said that Guren wouldn't let himself get killed!"

"Was that really true?" Mitsuba asked.

"The day when… Yuu can kill Mika is the day I can kill Guren," Shinya tried.

"That's right, actually," Yuu said. "I doubt Shinya did it. I refuse to believe that being able to kill someone so close to you is possible, and I couldn't kill Mika even if my life depended on it, I'd rather die myself. Heck, I'd rather die than watch Mika die!"

For some reason, Ferid let out an amused sound at this, but when everyone turned to look at him, he just waved his hand to signal for them to continue.

"I was just thinking about how interesting it has become, this turn of events," Ferid said.

Kureto cleared his throat. "Let's resume then." He looked to Yuu. "What evidence do you have that Shinya didn't commit the murder?" he asked.

"Guren's hand," Yuu said. "He had written something on his palm. Because it was left in the running water it wasn't possible to clearly see what it was supposed to be, but I'm pretty sure he was attempting to write a name, probably of his murderer." He said.

"Really?" Kureto asked. "What did it look like it said?"

Yuu found his sketch of what had been written on Guren's palm and he showed it to everyone.

"It's three symbols," Yoichi said.

"This excludes me and Mika," Yuu said.

"You weren't even suspects to begin with," Kureto snapped.

"True," Mika said. "We were the first ones to discover the body after all," he looked to Yuu and sighed because of the fact that his friend was as hopeless as he was.

"Yeah… uh…" Yuu didn't say anything after that, knowing that he had stated the little too obvious fact.

"The first two signs are very unclear but it doesn't look like 'chi' (チ) or 'ba' (バ)" Yoichi said while studying the paper. "This clears both me and Mitsuba from suspicion."

"It doesn't look like 'ya' (ヤ) either," Shinya said while studying the paper. He then passed it to Kureto who studied it as well and passed it to Mitsuba.

"You're right," Mitsuba confirmed. But it could look like a 'shi' (シ) and 'n' (ン) and the 'ya' (ヤ) has just been written in a weird way," she handed the paper to Mika who studied it as well.

"No," he said. "Unless this was written at his time or dying, there is no reason for one symbol to look weird. And this reason is impossible since there was no pen at the crime scene. I noticed that fact," he said.

Yuu and Shigure could both agree to this. Neither of them had seen a black pen either.

"If this was written on Guren's palm and there was nothing to use for writing at the crime scene, then it must mean that he wrote it beforehand, right?" Yuu asked while looking at Mika.

"I think so," Mika stated.

"This means that Guren knew he would die and he knew who was going to kill him," Yuu deducted.

"He'd noticed Shinya's schemes from the get-go," Shigure said.

"I don't think so," Yuu said. "If Shinya had been the culprit, then Guren wouldn't have seen it coming, but he had."

"Then, do you have a name of the actual culprit, if it isn't Shinya?" Kureto asked.

Yuu smiled. "Actually, I do," he said while showing the paper to everyone. "If you look closely at the two darker spots above the first faded line you will see what I mean. They are slightly connected. It doesn't say 'shi' (シ) I'm not sure what it says though."

Mika took a quick look. "If I'd have to say anything it looks like, it would probably be a 'ku' (ク)" he said.

"And the last one could be 'to' (ト)" Yuu said.

"What about the one in the middle?" Shinya asked, leaning slightly forward, facing Yuu and Mika.

"There's only one name that we know that starts on 'ku' (ク) and ends on 'to' (ト)" Yuu said.

"But the water has washed most of the pen off," Kureto said. "There isn't really any certain proof that it's me who killed him," he said.

"Not really," Yuu said. "except the fact that you are the one spending the most time in the library and that we all know that you are good at solving cases, probably better than Shinya, but not as good as Guren," he said. "And again, you will have to note the fact that Guren had seen it coming,"

"What if he just realized in the last minute when it was already too late for him to do anything about it," Kureto said. "There isn't a single proof towards anything else."

"That's actually wrong too," Mika said. "The proof is Yuu," he said.

"Me?" Yuu asked.

Mika nodded. "You were missing for several days and then showed up along with Guren and claimed that you'd learned how to read. Then suddenly you can solve complicated cases on a level almost on pare with the murder victim whom you probably spent all the time with while you were missing," he said.

Realizing this, Yuu could almost see what Mika meant. "So you are saying that Guren taught me how to solve cases because he already knew that he was going to die back then?" he asked.

Mika nodded at this.

"And he only taught me to make sure that the culprit would get the challenge from someone he wouldn't believe was a threat?" Yuu said in thoughtfulness. He recalled what Guren had said while demanding Yuu to read all those books and take notes.

 _"_ _Because you are the one who gets the least of what is going on in this situation,"_ Guren had said as his reasoning for asking Yuu to read all these books. That was exactly why he had been chosen to solve this case and take over once Guren had died.

"Your plan would have worked," Yuu said. "If it weren't for the fact that Guren had seen though your plans from the beginning," he smiled while staring Kureto in the eyes.

"It does seem like something Kureto would do," Shinya said.

"I'd rather believe this than if Shinya-san did it," Yoichi said.

"Same here," Mitsuba said.

Shigure nodded as well. "I just want Guren's true murderer to be punished." She said.

Kureto let out a sigh before nodding his head. "It seems he taught you well," he said while looking at Yuu. "I never saw that one coming, so I guess I won the battle but lost the war," he said.

"You could say that," Yuu answered, not really being sure what Kureto was actually talking about.

"So, it's about time we cast the votes isn't it?" Ferid asked while tilting his head.

"It is," Kureto said.

Everyone cast their votes and it really was true. Kureto had been the one to commit the murder on Guren. He smiled as Ferid announced the results.

"So, this is it, isn't it?" Ferid asked, looking at Kureto.

"It's game over," Kureto agreed before stepping down and walking up beside Ferid. "Good luck," he said drily while Ferid walked down to stand beside him. Then he was led away.

* * *

 **There might be someone here who didn't understand the discussion of spelling names during the trial. It was based on the Japanese katakana (one of the writing systems, the others are called hiragana and kanji). I had this idea that their names shouldn't be written with kanji, as most of them normally are, because it might give away too much of their identity. And then I simply decided on katakana because they can look more similar to each other than the hiragana. I've talked too much.**

 **Thank you for reading.**

 **Jackie**


	10. Daily World

It was way past midnight. Everyone was sitting in the dining room with a glass of cola in front of them. Some glasses were about half full, but most hadn't been touched at all. There was a strange silence in the room, filled with just one unspoken question.

What do we do?

"I can't take it anymore!" Yuu exclaimed suddenly. "What exactly are we going to do? We can't just sit here until the end of time!"

"Why don't you think up something then?" Mitsuba asked in a dry tone.

"You better think too!" Yuu yelled before he withdrew into his own head to start digging through his memories. He wanted to figure out if he had been in a somewhat similar situation before, being lost and not knowing what to do. Something told him he hadn't but he wanted to dig through his memory to be completely certain that this was not the case.

What Yuu came up with, was nothing. He couldn't find anything at all. It was as if everything before he woke up in the dining room with Mika was one big blank!

"I can't remember anything," Yuu said suddenly.

Everyone turned to look at him, and then looked away.

"That's what's expected, Yuu," Mika said. "You really aren't that smart so-"

"I said I don't remember anything!" Yuu exclaimed.

"That's because you're stupid," Shinya said.

"Are you copying Guren?" Yuu asked.

"I'm not even trying," Shinya answered. "I'm stating facts."

"I'm not stupid!" Yuu yelled then.

"Calm down, Yuu," Mika tried to comfort Yuu. "We are all feeling a bit off because of all that have happened, it's okay." He said.

Yuu felt even more angered from this. He wasn't saying that he couldn't remember because he was stupid. He knew he didn't have that much brain capacity, but this was different. Normally you would remember more than just what had happened about a month ago. When you were 16 years old, you should at least have some memories of when you were younger and such.

"Yuu-kun's right," Yoichi suddenly said. "I don't remember anything either, at least I don't remember anything from before I woke up here," he said.

"That's what I'm talking about!" Yuu yelled while smiling.

Mitsuba shut her eyes and gave the matter some thought before she opened them and a surprised expression appeared on her face. "Me neither," she said.

"Me neither," Shigure answered while looking between Shinya and Mika.

"I don't remember anything either…" Shinya said.

"I don't think I do either…" Mika finally said.

"So it really wasn't just me!" Yuu smiled happily at everyone. "I'm not that stupid."

"Sorry, Yuu-kun, but I think you are," Yoichi said and everyone else nodded in agreement.

"That's not fair!" Yuu yelled.

Shinya laughed before picking up his glass of cola and drinking half of the content. "It seems the mood has been lifted, only an idiot can do that," he smiled at Yuu who smiled back.

"Thanks," he said, not realizing the insult Shinya had mixed in his sentence.

Mika also drank some of his cola. "But what do we do to regain our memories?" he asked.

"You don't know?" Yoichi asked.

"I don't," Yuu stated.

"That would just be impossible," Mika said.

"I don't have a clue either," Shinya said. "Except…. Maybe we could ask that mastermind we have wondering around," he said.

"Did someone call for me?" Ferid entered the dining hall and sat down in their midst. He smiled widely at all of them as they met him with frowning faces.

"We have learned that we don't have any memories from before we ended up here and were wondering how this could be," Mika said. "We figure you may know something about it."

Ferid was silent while putting on a more thoughtful smile. He looked like he really was keeping secrets and it could very well be this they were looking for.

"Indeed," he said. "I know something, but knowledge isn't given for free like that," he said.

"You're having way too much fun," Yuu said.

"What's the prize?" Mika asked, seeming willing to give whatever it took for the knowledge Ferid had.

However, Ferid didn't give it up that easily. "I don't want any prize for this much information, besides, what you can give will never be enough."

Mika looked unsure, and then he looked down.

"What do you want then?" Yuu asked.

"I want you to figure it out. Go to sleep now and then you'll have a few hours in the morning to investigate. Look through the library, play some games if you like, check the kitchen or give me something and I might give you bits and pieces of information," he smiled.

With those words, Ferid got up and left the room. The others were sitting around the table. Still with a glass of cola in front of them. They kept on sitting there for another half an hour until every glass was empty.

"I'll go read some books," Mitsuba said.

"It might be a good idea," Shinya said.

"Didn't he tell us to sleep?" Yoichi asked.

"We're just discussing what we're gonna do tomorrow," Shinya said. "I'd personally rather check out the games though," he said in relation to the previous subject.

"I'll look through the books then," Shigure said.

"Me too," Yoichi said.

"Then Yuu and I will play games!" Shinya said. "And Mika?" he asked while looking to Mika.

"I think I'm gonna get some answers from Ferid," Mika said. "I know where to find him and I think I will be able to ask the right questions, and he does have important information." He stated.

"Good point," Shinya said. "And with that planned, let's get some rest," he said.

And so they all did.

As Yuu closed the door to his room he thought of how long a day it had already been. He had discovered Guren in the bathroom and then they had spent hours investigating before they had held the trial. Then they had been sitting around the dining room, doing nothing, and only after this gotten another task before they went to bed.

"What a night…" Yuu muttered as he laid himself down on his bed and his head hit the pillow. He didn't manage to think another thought before he fell asleep.

* * *

 **This chapter is the second to last. I guess you'd already figured as much. Also, this is the absolutely shortest chapter of the story. I did put a lot of thought into it. I remember. I actually had trouble finding out how they would figure out that they had lost their memories. I hope you don't find it weird or anything.**

 **Anyways, thanks for reading.**

 **Jackie**


	11. Deadly World

It was now morning. Mika had quickly prepared some breakfast and they had finished that up as quickly as possible to get started on the investigation of what was actually behind this. Yuu and Shinya found themselves in the gaming room. Shinya was looking through all the video games they had and Yuu was watching from the sidelines.

"Are we sure this holds any information?" Yuu asked while watching Shinya work.

"Nothing can be said for sure," Shinya answered while looking through the games. He picked out one game and started reading on the backside.

"What are you doing?"

"Apparently this game is about setting bombs to make the other players blow up. If you blow up, stand in the path of a bomb, you die. If you are the last one standing, you win. It's an old game… I think it's at least ten years old, if not even older, maybe from the 90's." Shinya said.

Yuu started looking through the games and noticed a similarity. "You're right, there are a few more games like that… but why?" he asked.

"I don't know… but…" Shinya opened the container of the game he had in his hands. "This one is empty," he said then.

"How come?" Yuu asked while looking over Shinya's shoulder.

Shinya didn't answered he just turned on the TV as it started in gaming mode. Then a game appeared.

"I think Mito-chan played this to get some practice in it," Shinya said. "We played it on the first day and she lost. I remember that she told me, Guren, Sayuri-chan and Shigure-chan to play the game with her on the night before Sayuri-chan and Shinoa-chan were murdered," Shinya explained.

"You remember that far back?" Yuu asked.

"It felt like I'd experienced something similar before," Shinya said thoughtfully. "I couldn't remember when I had that experience, but this just makes me more certain. Mito-chan was practicing this game to try and beat us in it," he smiled.

Yuu started looking through the other games. There were a lot. In the very back he even found some visual novels. At this point, Shinya had turned back to look at them too.

"What are these?" Yuu asked.

"Visual novels, single player games," Shinya answered in a tone that clearly indicated that he didn't find them very interesting. Yuu understood. From what he had seen, most of the others were more found of the multi-player games.

Yuu decided to look closer at the visual novels. The first one he looked at was called _Bakemonogatari Portable_. From what Yuu could read on the backside, it was about vampires and some other unimportant stuff. The next he found was called _Diabolik Lovers_. Whatever the plot actually was, Yuu could quickly conclude that this was also about vampires. Another one was called _Rosario + Vampire Capu2 – The Rhapsody of Love and Dreams_. Yuu didn't even have to look at the back to know that this was another vampire-related game.

"What's with this?" he asked.

"What's with what?" Shinya asked.

"Why are all the games I've been looking at about vampires?" Yuu asked while looking up from a fourth game about vampires.

"I think some girls tend to feel some kind of attraction towards the supernatural. Especially vampires who have been labeled as being super good looking in modern teens literature, has become popular," Shinya explained.

"How do you know?" Yuu asked.

"Think I read an article somewhere about it in the past," Shinya answered. "And these are also some love-story games, so it's kind of obvious," he smiled before he laid eyes on one game that Yuu hadn't looked at yet. He reached past the teen and grabbed it and read the title and then on the backside.

"This is interesting" he said. "Some kids are stuck in a survival game? This actually seems like a game," he smiled as he finished reading and opened up the machine to take out the bomb game that Mito had been playing.

"Are you going to play it?" Yuu asked.

"It doesn't appear to hold any vampires and it also differs in the way the summary is written and the design, so why not?" Shinya asked before opening the container of the game. Then he stared.

"What is it?" Yuu asked.

Shinya sighed and lied back on the floor. "Oh well, guess we shouldn't waste time on this. The game isn't even there anyways," he said.

Yuu barely even got the time to wonder why before an announcement was made by Ferid, who informed them that the time to investigate was up and they now had to face the last trial.

Yuu and Shinya got up from the gaming room floor and headed out to meet up with everyone else as the trial could begin.

Everyone met up in silence and also followed Ferid inside the trial room in silence. They all found their stands and stood up on them only waiting for the trial to begin.

"So, what is the task at hand exactly?" Shigure broke the silence as the first one.

"Well," Ferid smiled. "You want to know what happened before you woke up here, don't you?" he asked. "If you figure it out, I will allow you to go free, but if you are unable to figure it out, I'll just…" he got a thoughtful smile on his face. "Find a good punishment for all of you?" he suggested.

"Okay," Yuu said smiling, confident that they would be able to beat Ferid at this game. He had all his friends after all. "So, let's start by discussing whatever we've found out."

"Oh," Ferid said. "Just a little catch. Until you have uncovered all the information I gave to Mika-kun, he is only allowed to answer either yes or no. I don't want this to be too easy."

"That's unfair!" Yuu exclaimed.

"It's fine," Mika answered. "I didn't get that much information anyway," he said.

"So… what did you figure out, Yuu-kun?" Yoichi asked.

"Well," Yuu looked unsure. "Not much, other that Mito had been playing some game at night and we got some strange visual novels," he said.

"Strange?" Mitsuba asked. "What do you mean?"

"All of them were about vampires in one way or another," Yuu said. "That's the only notable thing we discovered in the gaming room."

"Why vampires?" Shigure wondered.

"Shinya said it's because they're popular or something," Yuu answered.

"That's about right," Shinya said.

"But what are visual novels doing here in the first place?" Yoichi asked.

"I just gathered up some random games for your entertainment," Ferid answered. "It might also be because I have a general fondness of vampires myself. It is fun to see what ideas people come up with,"

"Why do you have that kind of interest, it's weird," Mitsuba declared.

"Don't you believe in the unknown too?" Ferid asked.

"Is this just a fondness of the unknown?" Shinya asked while raising an eyebrow at the strange way Ferid was talking.

"Maybe?" Ferid smiled calmly.

"What's next?" Shigure asked. "Are you going to say that you too are a supernatural creature?"

"If he is, it's probably not just a supernatural creature," Yuu said. "I know I'm not that smart… but considering the themes of the games in the gaming room, wouldn't it be easy to assume that he's actually a vampire?"

"Yes," Mika answered.

"What?" Yuu turned to Mika. "Are you saying Ferid is a vampire?" he asked.

"Yes," Mika answered.

"Ups," Ferid smiled. "Guess I said too much."

"Well, that's what you get for not keeping your mouth shut," Shinya said.

"What other clues have we got?" Shinya asked.

"This," Shigure held out a burnt piece of paper. "It doesn't hold much information, but a few words are clear. It is an experiment report written about a girl named… Akane I think… It is from some place called Hyakuya labs. It also says something about experimentation and something called Seraph of The End," she summarized.

"Akane?" Yuu mumbled. It seemed to ring a bell. He remembered a girl's face, brown eyes and long brown hair in a braid. A warm feeling came along with the image. He wasn't sure how to describe it. Like he felt loved, cared for, like he belonged somewhere. It felt like "Family…?" he then mumbled.

"Does the paper say anything else?" Shinya asked.

"Only something about progress and a place called Hyakuya Orphanage," Shigure said.

"Akane… could it be the name of a kid's pet, and then they are from Hyakuya Orphanage?" Mitsuba suggested.

"I don't think that's it," Yuu said. "I think Akane is a person, a child from Hyakuya Orphanage,"

"How can you be so sure?" Mitsuba asked.

"Well…" Yuu trailed off. "It's just… I think I remember a face in relation to that name, Akane." He said.

"Yes," Mika said.

"Do you remember her too?" Yuu asked.

"Yes," Mika said though there was a tiny hint of doubt in his eyes.

"You are supposed to remember her, you knew her in the past? Did I know her too?" Yuu asked.

"Yes," Mika answered.

"So, not only are you suggesting that this Akane was a human experiment, but are you also suggesting that the two of you were human experiments?" Shigure asked.

"I don't know." Yuu turned to Mika. "Are we?" he asked.

Mika shrugged, not being entirely sure of what Yuu was asking.

"Are you human experiments?" Shigure asked.

"Yes," Mika said.

"We also found a list of so-called spell organizations," Mitsuba said. "There were two marked to exist in Tokyo, Japan. Mikado no Oni and Hyakuya Sect," she summed up. "The head of Mikado no Oni is Hiiragi Tenri, nothing is known of Hyakuya sect though,"

"Except that they were involved with human experimentation," Shigure said drily.

"Are there any other spell organizations in Japan?" Shinya asked.

"There is one in Nagoya called Mikado no Tsuki," Mitsuba read. "The leader is… Sakae Ichinose, but that has been scratched out. I don't know why," she said.

"I think I do," Shinya said. "I think he's dead."

"Then who is the new leader?" Yoichi asked. "They must have gotten a new one since then?"

"Is that really important?" Mitsuba asked.

"I have a feeling I should know…" Shigure said.

"I just wonder why Guren is popping into my head," Shinya said.

"Maybe because he is the leader of Mikado no Tsuki?" Yuu suggested the most likely answer that wouldn't be completely useless.

"You're right," Ferid's smile seemed to widen. "Guren, who was participating in this game, was the son of Ichinose Sakae, Ichinose Guren. Just like Kureto is the son of Hiiragi Tenri."

"Are you starting to tell us our actual names?" Mika asked.

"Can you speak now?" Yuu asked.

"I told what I knew," Mika said. "That Ferid is a vampire, that we know a girl named Akane and that the three of us were all human experiments of the Hyakuya Sect,"

"I can say your names if you want it that badly," Ferid sighed, but the smile remained. "Shindo Mikaela and Amane Yuuichiro, or as you are known today, Hyakuya Mikaela and Hyakuya Yuuichiro," he said.

"So what everyone thought was our names was actually just a short version?" Yuu asked.

"Or your nicknames," Ferid said. "We also have Kimizuki Shiho, Goshi Norito and Narumi Makoto who are all commonly known by their surnames. And then there are those who are actually called by their first names, Hanayori Sayuri, Yukimi Shigure, Juujou Mito, Sanguu Mitsuba, Saotome Yoichi, Hiiragi Shinoa, Hiiragi Mahiru and Hiiragi Shinya," Ferid listed.

"I'm not buying it. I'm not gonna believe that I'm related to a person who would kill someone in cold blood," Shinya stated.

"I did hear someone say you were adopted to marry Mahiru, but my points aren't valid," Ferid smiled.

"Reminds me," Mika said. "You said you had some pictures of a catastrophe that happened eight years ago, right?" he asked.

"Correct," Ferid said.

"Show them," Mika said, his eyes narrowed a bit.

"Only if you pay me," Ferid said.

"Will you show them to everyone?" Mika asked.

Ferid seemed to think that through before he nodded. "Yes, I suppose I will." He said.

"Then I pay the prize," Mika said.

"What prize, what's he talking about, Mika?" Yuu asked. But before he could get an answer, Ferid was standing by Mika's side, already having his fangs buried in Mika's neck. Mika just stood still and let him do it.

"Stop it!" Yuu yelled, confused. He didn't receive a reaction though. Not until about a minute had passed and Ferid finally let go to look up at everyone else.

"There was actually one truth that Mikaela-kun didn't tell you," he said.

"What?" Yuu asked.

Ferid smiled before pulling Mika's lower lip down to reveal his teeth. "See there?" he asked. "He actually has some rather sharp fangs compared to humans, don't you think?" he asked.

"That's just-" Yuu tried to interrupt, but Ferid wasn't finished.

"I have them too, sharp fangs that can pierce through human skin, right into their veins to suck out their blood. But he does differ from us complete vampires," Ferid said. "He isn't entirely complete as you can see in his blue eyes. So I've been visiting his room every night to give him the blood of the one who turned him into a vampire," he said.

"You don't mean…. Mika… " Yuu couldn't find the words to finish his sentence.

"He is a vampire, just like me," Ferid said.

"Get away from me," Mika said, now turning to push Ferid away.

"So cruel," Ferid smiled before disappearing from Mika's side and reappearing on his seat. "I have to show you some pictures now, since Mika-kun donated his delicious blood,"

As such a canvas came down from the ceiling and pictures appeared on it. The first one was of a burning town. The next was of people who were lying on the ground, appearing to be sick. One had already died it seemed. The third was of children, dressed in identical black and white uniforms with a collar around their neck.

"What…" Yoichi stared at the pictures.

"What's this supposed to be?" Mitsuba asked, looking at the pictures with horrified eyes.

"What happened?" Shinya asked.

"I think…" Yuu trailed off while thinking. "Tokyo is burning on the first picture, due to… people getting sick and dying suddenly? And then there are children who look like they have been captured…"

"Here's another one," Ferid put on a new picture, showing children with some kind of tube attached to their collars. It looked like something was going through the tubes, coloring them red.

"They are having their blood taken, right?" Yuu asked.

"Indeed," Ferid smiled.

"So, the world ended because of a disease, and then, somehow, the children survived and were captured by someone who wanted their blood." Yuu concluded.

"You're smarter than you're made out to be." Ferid smiled. "Here's a last one, as a reward." He showed a last picture of a bright room, with a bloodstained floor and bodies of children, dressed in the same uniform as the children on the two previous pictures.

"Why are they… dead?" Yoichi asked.

"Were they murdered?" Shigure asked.

"No," Yuu said. "I think… I think they were trying to escape from those guys who took their blood?"

"Vampires," Mika said in a low voice before going on in a louder voice. "Their blood was taken by vampires, just like ours! Our family, Yuu-chan!"

"Yuu-chan?" Yuu turned to look at Mika, but before he could finish his action, Mika had moved up to him and wrapped both arms around him.

"Yuu-chan! I remember!" he exclaimed. "We used to live in the Hyakuya Orphanage but then the catastrophe happened and we were taken by the vampires. You, me, Akane and everyone else. After four years I thought we'd found a way to escape but then Ferid showed up just before we reached the exit!"

"Mika?" Yuu said in a slightly questioning voice as he now responded to Mika's hug. As Mika explained everything, he remembered too. He remembered all that Mika had said. He remembered the children, Akane, the day when Mika had come home with that map leading to the exit, their hope and their despair when Ferid showed up. The others had all been killed and Mika's arm had been torn off, he had been dying and told Yuu to run.

"It's… it's my fault," Mika said.

"It's my fault," Yuu argued. "I ran away and was saved because… I met Guren!"

"Who was part of the black demon company," Shinya continued.

"At one point, we became friends, Yuu-kun," Yoichi said. "And we ended up joining the Moon Demon Company along with Shinoa-san and Kimizuki-kun, and formed a squad with them and Mitsuba-san."

Ferid chuckled. "It appears you have uncovered the truth behind the world outside, as well as my identity. So, I guess I lost this game. But at least I didn't get bored."

"Now, how do we get out?" Yuu asked.

"Easy," Ferid said. "There should be an exit right between the media room and the dining room, go there and you'll find a direct way outside," he said.

Without offering Ferid another word, everyone turned to head towards the exit. Mika let go of Yuu because it would be difficult for the both of them to walk otherwise.

No one said a word as they walked through the hallways for the last time. They were all simply trying to comprehend the facts and process all the memories they had just regained.

They all stopped in front of the door that led to the outside. No one said a word at first before Mitsuba broke the silence.

"Are we sure we want this?" she asked.

"What else is there to do?" Yuu asked. "There is still a world out there. We've lived in it for eight years. What's going to be different from then and until now?"

Mitsuba bit her lip. "You… you're right," She looked up and smiled at Yuu. "Sorry, Yuu," she said.

"Yuu-chan?" Mika asked. "We're still family, right?" he asked.

Yuu smiled at him. "Weren't you the one who told me that all children from the Hyakuya orphanage are family?" he asked.

Mika's face lit up as he nodded and smiled. "I guess I was," he said.

Yuu then turned to the door. "Well, I don't know about you guys, but I want to rediscover what's out there," he said before reaching out and grabbing the door handle. Then he opened the door and all of them went outside to the world they had come from.

* * *

 **This is the end, guess they survived.**

 **About those visual novels, I don't know most of them at all. I went and googled visual novels and looked through what I found in search for something including vampires. If I failed, I'm sorry, but that was at least my intent.**

 **Anyways, the story is now over. I hope you liked it. I'm wondering about something. Which case did you find was the best? I don't need a reason if you don't want to tell me that, but I'm curious as to know where I might have done the best job.**

 **Thank you to noname 635 for favoriting and thank you to AmayR, Clovely Rainbow x, and Shiranai Atsune for following. I'm happy about that. **

**Thank you for reading**

 **Jackie**


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